


Unravel

by tragakes (lejf)



Series: To Different Worlds [1]
Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Attempted Murder, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Bukkake, Coming Untouched, Glory Hole, M/M, Mech Preg, Phone Sex, Rape/Non-con Elements, Semi-Public Sex, Shockwave is an actual pervert & deviant, Shockwave shouting: the show, Somewhat canon divergent, Two hornyboys against the world, Voyeurism, he's involved in sex like once a chapter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-25
Updated: 2018-06-14
Packaged: 2019-05-13 15:39:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 68,294
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14751642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lejf/pseuds/tragakes
Summary: The energon crisis rampages, Vector Sigma falters, Nominus Prime falls, Proteus rises, the Clampdown bares its glistening teeth and the people churn ever further into turmoil.Yet Senator Shockwave cannot disentangle himself from law officer Orion Pax.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Our Old Tricks](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11657022) by [StarlightCaptivator](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarlightCaptivator/pseuds/StarlightCaptivator). 



> " _My_ Shockwave— was _full of life_. He’d laugh at the world one minute, throw punches at it the next." - Optimus Prime, Transformers: Dark Cybertron, Finale.

His instinct is to drop the thing when he finishes the first sentence. He wants to watch the data pad shatter into a thousand small pieces, but for once he reels in the brash edge so ‘unbecoming of a senator’. 

As it is, he clutches onto his desk for balance, then clutches his head, though his optics don’t cease scanning its contents between the gaps of his fingers. It’s the most ludicrous thing he’s ever read. Proteus. Damn him. Expressing interest to _court_ Shockwave. What sort of new vile plot is this?

There’s not a flicker of doubt that it’s not a plot. They’d clashed helms within the first day Shockwave had stepped into the Senate. Proteus himself was the one who said Shockwave wasn’t fit to be a senator, too emotional and outspoken. 

Slag Proteus. 

Shockwave isn’t sure what a courtship will even entail. From what he knows, it can be exceedingly personalised, its period indeterminately long, and, if accepted, will end in a Bonding ceremony that is sealed with interface and a spark-bond. He highly doubts Proteus wants to actually bond into Conjunx Endura, and it’s more than likely that the entire charade is merely an instrument to _control_ him.

He doesn’t need to be adept in the subtle manoeuvres of power plays to realise that general opinion among the senators leans towards Proteus. Dai Atlas is an exception, as is Momus, but they’re too unorganised. Momus, with his common roots as a foreman in a mining facility, is less opposed to Functionism than he is opposed to the general upper class; and his good friend Dai Atlas is too much of a pacifist and only _stews_ in disagreement. The others are so minor that Shockwave doesn’t even know them by name.

Therefore _Shockwave_ is the primary voice of dissent in the Senate, and it becomes apparent that Proteus recognises this when he reaches the end of the data pad. He’s written, in what might’ve seemed to be off-topic note, two words.

‘Skywarp. Soundwave.’

Two designations of the outliers Shockwave keeps in his care in the Academy, hidden from the condemnation that Functionism dictates for him. 

He suspects Skywarp was seen teleporting somewhere. The flight-frame has never learnt to be particularly discreet, though Shockwave can’t fault him. Soundwave the telepath is more of a concern. He would never be as reckless, and this leads him to the conjecture that somebody is _deliberately looking into his Academy_ , following the leads and surveillance from when his outliers were still mechs on the streets.

Shockwave has a missive pulled up immediately. It’s too late to visit the Academy at this hour without attracting suspicion, and he can’t risk notifying Proteus that he’s _afraid_ that the Senate is watching the mechs under his care. That would reveal he had too much to hide.

> Skids,

Shockwave writes to one of his theoreticians who he more than suspects to also be an outlier, though he hasn’t admitted as such to Shockwave yet.

> I apologise to interrupt you at this late hour. I believe I may have left the lights in my private laboratory on. Would you please hurry over and confirm this for me? I am unfortunately otherwise occupied.

His mechs respect him far too much to ever intrude into his private laboratory when he is not there, and Skids knows this. It’s a thinly layered plea to visit the Academy and discern if all is well.

The reply is almost instant. Skids is on his way. It’s no trouble. He had planned to return to the Academy by early morning. 

Foreboding looms in his spark. Surely it’s no coincidence that this data pad had been delivered in the dark of night, by an unscrumptious bot whose description from the receptionist Shockwave did not recognise. He dreads to hear what Skids will report. 

He digs his hands into the back of the data pad, swiftly transforming a finger into a few delicate tools that pry open its panels to feel around the insides of its electronics. There’s a rounded cube that he recognises to be a transmitter. It’s removed easily, wires re-routed with fluid speed, and he lays it out onto his fingertip to inspect it carefully.

Ah. One of those transmitters that pings a frequency when the contents have scrolled to the bottom. Shockwave feels a flare of fury that he’d been too shocked to check for tampering first and had actually _been caught_ by something so infernally mundane. He delves back into the guts of the data pad and reels out its inner components, dissecting it and laying it out on his desk until the self-erasing mechanism that’d been point five nano-kliks away from executing is disabled.

There’s no overt reason why it should be self-erasing. The contents in themselves aren’t incriminating; nothing in them proves that Proteus is threatening Shockwave — he can’t use it against Proteus without admitting that Soundwave and Skywarp _are_ his wards. Certainly, he could try appear insulted that Proteus attempted to attribute him to outliers, but it’s too underhanded for his tastes, too vague and flimsy. It’d be more likely to backfire by causing him to appear paranoid. 

Furthermore, if he were to announce its contents publicly, it’d bring to eye that _Proteus announced to court Shockwave_. He does not want to bring that storm down on his helm. 

Another wave of anger catches him when he realises the deeper barbs of Proteus’ proposal. Shockwave has always been known to value his own beauty, vain as it may seem, and here it has been turned against him in the most despicable of ways. If Proteus, truly, has harmed his wards, then Shockwave cannot decline his courtship proposal and undoubtedly that will make him the topic of much whispering in the Senate. Senator Shockwave, the fiery opposition of Proteus, suddenly accepting his courtship? Either it will be evident that Proteus has a hold over him or he will be dismissed as _air-headed_. Fighting Proteus merely for his _attention_ , changing his colours so that Proteus would see and notice. 

It is insult and injury against the two things Shockwave prides himself in: intelligence and beauty. An unholy cocktail of both. Shockwave is _livid._

The rough edges of this plot are slowly coalescing. There is no weapon in the data-pad against Proteus because the erasing function was against _Shockwave_. Erasing the data was intended to panic him, to make him disbelieve if he’d seen it at all in the dead of this night. Proteus is attempting to put him on edge. 

As much as he may have preserved the data pad’s message, the truly spiteful realisation is that it is still _working_. Shockwave _is_ on edge.

When Skids’ comm message comes through, it is too much.

Soundwave has disappeared. Neither do any of his cassettes remain in the Academy. Skywarp still remains, but in this instant of time, this is a small comfort. 

Shockwave finds himself forced to take a seat at his desk. When he types, it is with sharp snaps of anger. 

> Senator Proteus,
> 
> Your proposal for courtship has been accepted. 
> 
> I have always found your lavish colours quite charming. If you’d be so kind to enlighten me, I do wonder where they originated from. The red-blue-white scheme is fairly _common_ , though I suppose you are differentiated by the Senate crest upon your chest and gold trimmings. Without them, and without that particularly garish polish — please change it, if you intend to gain my approval —, you could be mistaken for any mech in the commons. Is this something you regard as appealing? I would be interested to hear your opinion.
> 
> Please put forth your best attempts to court me. All are equal under the eye of Primus, but I do not settle for the slobbery.
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Senator Shockwave.

When he is finished, he does not send it, but feels sick to his tanks nonetheless. The walls of his living space are too small. To send this is to sentence himself into the servos of a bot who is the very head of manipulation and corruption of the Senate. Will he be subjected to constant surveillance in the name of ‘protecting his intended’? Will he be publicly humiliated? Will this turn Dai Atlas on him?

He needs to contact Dai Atlas as well.

But he cannot stay in the privacy of his own home any longer. Some reckless part of him itches to be outside, although he doubts he can arrange to meet Dai Atlas at this hour. Any other mech would be asleep. The only places he can visit are unsavoury. 

Nonetheless, he leaves. The security systems of the complex tell him that there are no mechs watching him, but as ever, there is no guarantee. Perhaps he will merely go for a walk. Perhaps he needs something else to unloosen this knot of frustration and worry building inside of him. The cool air of the nighttime is already soothing the processor-ache as he takes the elevator down his building. 

There is an anonymous pleasure house that he entertains very, very rarely. It’s reserved for the worst of days. This certainly qualifies as one, and he assumes that if he accepts this courtship, he can never risk going again for risk of watching optics and ‘public shame’.

He debates it, weighs whatever benefits and disadvantages could arise, and eventually pushes it back in the task queue in lieu of penning his message to Dai Atlas. The elevator slides open and he crosses out the foyer to the main street. The receptionist, whose alt-mode is a monitor and quite fond of him, waves to him as the doors open. He smiles blearily back. 

> Dai Atlas,
> 
> I have a little riddle for you. What is the difference between kinematics and kinetics?
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Shockwave.

This one he sends. He’s not entirely convinced the devoutly religious Dai Atlas will understand immediately, but a simple search on the Grid should tell him that kinematics is of motion, and kinetics is concerned with _the forces_ that cause it. It is more blatant than Shockwave would like, but there’s a sweet conciseness to the warning that he savours. 

Shockwave is telling Dai Atlas to differentiate between the movements and the larger hands guiding them. He might not be the only one targeted and, more importantly, if he _does_ send his letter accepting the courtship, then he wants Dai Atlas to be fore-warned. Part of him knows that this is because he doesn’t want _Dai Atlas’_ judgement on top of everything else. 

What a mess. It’s a mess. 

He wallows in the despair of it for a long time. Skywarp and Soundwave. 

Finally Shockwave looks up to find that his pedes have brought him to the pleasure house. It is not outwardly advertised as one, and indeed pleasure isn’t even its primary function; Shockwave merely refers to it in his head as such. Outwardly, it is a bar for the relatively upper class. 

Nothing ostentatious. From its unassuming visage Shockwave enters through one of the side alleys, sweeping scanners back to reassure himself that he hasn’t been followed. His fingertip opens and processes through the miniature lock-pad on the door easily and he is admitted into the demure back-corridors of the bar.

Nightbeat would’ve received notice as soon as he entered. Typically, he would come to greet and lead him to a room. Shockwave, however, is not feeling such patience tonight. 

> Nightbeat, I assume I’m welcome. Please notify me if this is not true.

Who else Nightbeat might host in these corridors, Shockwave is unsure. He briefly chastises himself that he didn’t call ahead. What if someone had been here? He could’ve played it off as visit to a friend. It’s not too distressing. But it’s still worrisome, because clearly Shockwave is losing his head. He ought to be _more_ cautious in lieu of these new developments, not _less._

> You are. Long time no see, friend.

Confirmation of his discretion acknowledged, he enters an empty room with another door that connects to a small set of washracks. There’s a single pillow in the corner — and a hole in the wall. It is, no ribbons and garnishes, a glory hole. 

Shockwave rests as he knows Nightbeat will start sending any interested mechs his way. Nightbeat leads an entire flourishing system in here, its cynosure being _secrecy_. From what he’s been told, Shockwave is not the only Senator who entertains, or is entertained, here; and certainly not the only upper class mech who comes for dalliances. 

A corresponder, Nightbeat likes to call himself. He’s deeply interested in _politics_ and so Shockwave can’t help but be bemused by his willingness to run something like this. If Shockwave were in his place, he would take it as an uninhibited opportunity to observe the fishbowl that is the undertones of parties with power. Nightbeat has _dirt_ , Shockwave muses, and usually he would be uncomfortable with a mech having a secret over him like this, but Shockwave knows that the place is not run for observation. Nightbeat had some lover from a lower caste — and tells Shockwave that this is his wish for others not to suffer the same place, to have some haven. 

Developing political ties and power is simply a fortunate consequence of it. Moreover, he would never ‘stoop so low’ as to humiliate bots with their interfacing habits, he’s said. 

He’s an idealistic bot — sometimes. But if his idealism is what keeps Shockwave safe, for now, it’s wise not to prod at it. 

The sound of delicate pedes and a spike suddenly sliding through the hole in the wall has Shockwave looking up. The hole itself is rimmed with soft mesh, to support spikes of all sizes without having to leave gaps through which Shockwave can be seen. Shockwave places the pillow in front of the spike and lowers himself to kneel before it, dragging a single delicate finger across its underside. 

It’s painted white and gold. A standard colour scheme. On the bigger size of average. Between its ridges are carefully imbedded bio lights. Shockwave tweaks over one, and the spike twitches. Easy play. Here Shockwave is in some domain of his own; he would not say that he has complete control — and, in fact, an aspect of the appeal is the depravement and degradation in the loss of it — but it is _some_ sphere outside of the usual, and while he can forget his thoughts of Proteus and the power schemes surrounding every other aspect of his life, he _will_.

He closes his lips around the tip of the spike, suckling gently on it. His fingers still dance up and down its length as he swipes his glossa over the heady bead of transfluid. 

It is all too straightforward to descend into familiar actions. He cocks his head and flattens his glossa, laving up and down this anonymous spike, and when he hears the mech on the other side grunt, keeps a groan to himself. There is something about bringing others pleasure that is immeasurably arousing to him. 

He sets a silent task for himself to bring this mech to overload with his mouth alone. His hands retreat down to his own panel that has retracted, rubbing down on his node at the head of his valve and sliding the other across his own spike. 

Shockwave pulls out some of the better tricks he has, opening his intake to take the spike entirely into his wet heat and fluttering his throat around it until the mech’s spike is fucking into his mouth. His lips are stretched over the broad girth of it as it drags through the mesh in him. It’s large and heavy, and he mentally calculates how long he _can_ as well as _should_ keep it up before he’ll left with remanent soreness. He adjusts his angle on it and then pulls off before plunging the spike back into his intake.

There is a _thud_ from the other side of the wall where the mech must’ve slammed their hands against it. Shockwave _sucks_ hard and then quite suddenly there is transfluid spilling into him as the spike jerks hard against the walls of his throat. His own fingers are pressing insistently into his valve and there are small sounds of wet lips parting as he fucks himself open. 

The spike slides out from between his lips, and to his surprise, it has not finished coming. Another shot of transfluid streaks across his cheek, his optics instinctively shuttering against it, before the spike disappears from the hole entirely. 

Shockwave doesn’t wipe the transfluid away. It adds another edge to the abasement. 

Shockwave is not the type to lose count of how many spikes he services in one night. Not long after the first has pulled away, Shockwave slowing the stimulation on his valve and node, does another take its place. He puts his hands into play because this next one is too long for his mouth alone, and the hours pass under increasing lewd swipes of his glossa. He presses the spikes against the closed seams of his lips as they come; transfluid has painted his face into complete debauchery by the sixth. 

He’s removed the pillow because his valve is leaking too profusely not to stain it. It runs down the inner, soft curve of his thighs as his mouth is occupied with spike after spike. They enjoy the roughness because by and large, he is anonymous; he is anyone they want to imagine. For this reason, Shockwave is careful about his placement every time, which spikes he allows fully down his intake, which ones he allows to hump his face like mechanimals.

He has a relatively smaller spike plunging into his mouth, a mech on the other side running a steady stream of _take it take you fragging whore_ loud enough to be discernible, when it pulls away suddenly and he hears the door on the other end slam open.

There are low, terse, words, the brief sound of a struggle, and Shockwave assumes it’s some estranged lover come to disparage the mech. He settles back, fingers still in his valve, edging himself, when the door on _his_ side also bursts open, the lock popping off its seams.

Shockwave knows it’s not Nightbeat before he even looks up, because Nightbeat doesn’t slam doors, and instead he’s met with the sight of a gorgeous blue and red mech and a blaster pointed into the room. He has this stern set of _power_ to him, a battle-mask closed over his mouth, and it’s clear he isn’t a thug though that is as far of any reassurance Shockwave can pull from his appearance alone. 

Shockwave says, “I know I have my fair share of fans, but this, truly, is a new record.” 

The obscure compliment is _not_ what he would’ve said if he’d had any longer moment to think. His valve pulses in disagreement and a fresh wave of arousal hits him hard enough to visibly leak around his fingers. He’d never pegged himself for an exhibitionist, but perhaps he learns something new everyday.

The panic is slow in coming. No one should have access to these back rooms. What will be the repercussions when this is sent out? Senator Shockwave, whore.

The weapon is holstered, but any hope he has of going unrecognised is dashed when the mech says, “Senator.”The low rumble flares the heat in Shockwave’s abdomen again and he blames it entirely on the fact that he’s aroused to high hell, even though the mech’s tone is flat and disapproving — and has all right to be. Whoever this mech is, he clearly hadn’t come expecting to find one of his society’s highest-ranked _senators_ kneeling in the back room of some bar with two fingers up his valve and come all over his face. 

“Please, don’t say that out loud. Do you have little experience with discretion?” He removes his hand from his valve and sees the mechs’ optics dart to follow the movement for just a moment, catching the glisten when his opening parts, and then they shoot back to his face as though furious Shockwave has managed to entice him into even _looking_ at his valve.

It hadn’t been his intention. Shockwave wipes his face with the back of his servo instead of his arm — to appear just the slightest more dignified — and it comes away wet with transfluid from at least eight different mechs. “Well?” he asks, because the mech is still there just _looking_. 

“Pax!” he hears down the corridor. “What’d you find?”

The door bangs shut just as abruptly as it had opened. Shockwave half-expects it to open _again_ to admit more mechs, but it stays closed. When it remains shut and the noise outside lowers, his tension dissipates and he stands to leave for the adjourning private washracks. He doesn’t think he’ll be servicing any more mechs tonight. The heat in him has quietened to a shimmer, and the troubled edge that he’d been fighting off is quickly making itself known again. 

_Pax_ has some sense not to let more people see Shockwave. At least that’s a meagre relief. Or another loose end.

 

* * *

 

The Academy is bright by day. Apparently most mechs hadn’t even noticed Soundwave had vanished. He was always particularly reticent, but Shockwave can’t help but feel disturbed by it all the same.

The morning finds him in the its hallways, Proteus’ proposal still weighing heavily on his processor because he hasn’t accepted it yet — outwardly composed despite last night’s near-disaster. Nightbeat had told him after that they were a few _law officers_ that’d stepped in to find an escaping convict somewhere in their area.

Shockwave believes — hopes, rather — that the stern law officer Orion Pax (he’d looked up his information almost immediately) won’t attempt to make an issue out of what he saw. From the reports on him, he appears an uptight citizen and professional, wholly devoted to justice. A scandal like that wouldn’t be something he cared to stir up.

Frankly, Shockwave has bigger concerns because they are tantamount to both his survival and the survival of his outliers. 

“I’ve been notified,” Shockwave says, to Skywarp, who he’d been lucky enough to catch alone in the hall without the usual accompaniment of Thundercracker, “that there are some _very_ dangerous optics watching you. Skywarp, have you done anything implicating?”

“What? No! Of course not!” 

Shockwave may not be able to devote his time to familiarising himself with each of the outliers individually, but he knows enough to tell by the sudden hike of Skywarp’s wings that he’s much more tense than he would be if it’d been an unfounded accusation.

“This is for your safety,” Shockwave says. He folds his arms and leans against the wall, mouth a set line. “I’m not here to scold you. As it is, Soundwave’s already gone missing, so this is a very _real_ danger. I don’t want you whisked away or this building coming down on our heads because of something that could be avoided, or at least something that could be prepared for.”

The wings hitch, impossibly, even higher. “I didn’t do anything, Shockwave. I swear.”

It’s a lost cause. Shockwave, resigned, turns away. Raises a hand to his helm. He can tell Skywarp feels panicked, and to further press him would merely send him into even more of a tizzy. For all Shockwave knows, Skywarp could simply be teleporting to relieve _stress_ , out in the open in the air where he feels safe. This could exacerbate it. 

“Wait!”

At first he thinks he imagines it, but then Skywarp has popped into existence in front of him, face pinched into distress. 

“I- maybe- I-“

“Skywarp,” Shockwave says. He stops walking. “Take your time.”

“I was careless,” he babbles. “Okay, maybe I wasn’t careless, maybe I–“

His face goes completely red. His wings flare out and so does his plating. His servos curl into fists. He squeezes his optics shut. Shockwave notes this all with a curious sort of detachment. 

“Maybe it’s ‘cause I just _hate_ being here, okay?! I don’t know if you realise this but everyone else treats TC and me like we’re scrap just ‘cause we _fly_!”

Shockwave folds his arms again, unimpressed. Inwardly, he starts to _seethe_. The anger at this point has no real anchor, directed at the other outliers who should know better than to bully and posture within themselves, directed at himself because _no, he hadn’t noticed_ , they’ve been _discreet_ about it, and finally directed at Skywarp because it’s such an _idiotic_ reason for him to sentence them _all_ to the threats of Proteus’ manipulations.

“You’re welcome to leave,” he says as calmly as he can, and he’s infamously known for _failing_ to be calm. In hindsight he knows he shouldn’t have started with this sentence. “I unfortunately hadn’t noticed the others’ treatment towards fliers, and I’m- for all that I’m terribly sorry for this, I have no power over them and what they think — and I can’t make a promise to you that I can persuade them to treat you better. I am less influential on _sparks_ than you may think. By and large, I–“ am no convincing orator, I am a _scientist_ , “-am only your benefactor.”

He runs one of his hands across his face. Skywarp is staring up at him with an expression that vacillates between so many emotions that Shockwave suspects he himself doesn’t know how he’s feeling, let alone be readable enough for Shockwave to begin to decode it.

“But as your benefactor, I _will_ use all my resources to ensure that you can find a place in which you are happier. I brought you here _because_ your lives were oppressed and squandered — omitted. This is still my duty.”

“That’s the thing,” Skywarp blurts. His optics fix on Shockwave with surprising intensity. Then his fingers nervously curl together. As usual, Skywarp is a heap of contradictions and a mess of composure. “There’s no place better. For now.”

And that’s possibly the worst thing Shockwave could hear right now, aside from _I want to join Proteus_. He tries not to let his dismay show, because it’s one thing to know that you’ve failed in the very venture of your duty and another to know that _you cannot fix it_. “I understand if you and Thundercracker wish to leave at some point. I will assist you however I can, though I do have one request.” One of Skywarp’s wings flick down to its usual height, at that. “Whatever route you choose, please, do not let it be one that endangers the others in this facility.”

“Because they’ve treated me so well,” Skywarp says, resentful.

“If you won’t do it for them, do it for _me_.” To his shame, it comes out biting. He eases back. “Or at the very least, consider yourself above pettiness and the need to take an optic for an optic.”

“Why do you even care so much?” His hands are wrung together again. “You’re not even an outlier!”

“For the very same reason why you feel the need to ask that question. _Because_ only outliers believe other outliers will have sympathy for them. Skywarp, I do not have to be the subject of injustice to feel injustice.” 

“But it’s–!” His wings have practically snapped back together now, and his shoulders are drawn up in anxiety. He glares into the ground as his processor works through enough sub-routines to come to a conclusion. “Okay. You know what? I promise. Okay?” His helm tips up and he jabs a finger forwards. “And it’s not for _them_. So don’t you dare tell them that.”

“You know I don’t want to hurt any of you,” Shockwave responds, and just like that Skywarp is gone, a backwards _fwop_ as he blinks out of the corridor. 

Shockwave just sighs and stands there for a moment, before turning on his pede to head for his own laboratory.

It turned out both better and worse than he’d hoped. The details of how Proteus knows Skywarp is both an outlier and connected to Shockwave are yet to be known; Skywarp and Thundercracker are resentful of staying in his Academy; but at the very least he has Skywarp’s word to be more cautious. 

It’s the greatest he can go for, at this point. Again he feels as though he’s stuck in some form of _damage control_. Events unspool from his servos too rapidly for him to grasp and he’s left braiding the ends into some semblance of order. If Proteus pulls out any more names of the outliers, then Shockwave will be marching to his death. Or perhaps something worse than that — Proteus will have him either persecuted or under his thumb as another one of his _cronies_. As though half the Senate and head of security isn’t enough. 

Occasionally Shockwave wishes he weren’t a senator so as to be freed from the stifling plots. If only Jhiaxian hadn’t failed. If only his idol and mentor had remained and Shockwave was never pressured to replace him. Yet, if Shockwave was not a senator, he would not have been able to open the Academy and begin harbouring outliers at all. 

Forget Skywarp. Shockwave is a bigger mess. 

“What’re you going to do about it?” he hears a voice ask, and inwardly curses. 

Damus is standing by the corner, his one optic flickering. 

“You know it’s rude to listen in, Damus, and even more to admit to it,” Shockwave says.

His claws click together nervously. “I thought you were going to call me Glitch from now, like everyone else does. Isn’t it my new name?”

“I apologise. It’s a force of habit.” 

“I don’t mind,” Damus says. He straightens to his full height. Shockwave still remembers pictures of what he’d been like before his empurata, generically handsome and quick to smile. The warbling heart hasn’t changed. “So Skywarp’s unhappy.”

“Because of you lot.”

“Are you going to punish us?”

It comes out so calmly and sincerely that Shockwave is taken aback. “Pardon?”

“How are you going to punish us?”

“I’m– Damus, I’m not going to _punish_ any of you. I _am_ angry. I _am_ disappointed. But I’m never going to turn my hand on or threaten any of you. If I do, you’ll be as afraid of me as you are of the rest of the Senate.”

“Then what?”

“I don’t know.” 

Damus’ side-fins droop. “I don’t like seeing you upset.”

“As much as that warms my spark, it’d do well to channel that sympathy into something for your peers.” He glances over Damus again, his small orange form. “Unless… do they harass you for your empurata, as well?”

The side-fins droop further. 

“I’m going to _kill_ them,” Shockwave hisses before he can rein in anything even resembling composure. 

“No, please–“ Damus raises his claws imploringly, then stops as though he remembers that he’s merely an _empurata victim_ while Shockwave is a Senator. If possible, Shockwave’s ire ratchets up even higher. “It’s nothing that bad. The fliers have it way worse than I do. We all tease and bicker. Sometimes it just gets a bit more _mean_.”

And that’s the crux of this second issue. Shockwave can’t even tell the group of outliers to stop ostracising by warning them that it’s driving Skywarp into enough stress to compromise their safety, because it’ll just make them _worse_ and jibe at him harder for putting their lives in danger. Likewise for Damus.

Shockwave is going to beat their afts into the _floor_. For some reason he finds it infinitely worse that Damus is quietly harassed than the fact that the seekers are. At least the flight frames have each other, and they can _fly_. There are advantages to being a flight frame — Shockwave knows this intimately —, whereas with empurata… empurata is a humiliation and nothing else. 

“I understand,” is what he says. “Damus.” He closes his hand around one of Damus’ claws, and the mech’s one optic somehow manages to look stricken. Those claws are what he uses to render machinery nonfunctional at the cost of his own pain. “You have been very brave.”

“Senator-“ Damus says, but Shockwave pulls away. 

“My Academy cannot be like this,” is all he replies.

The rest of the day he toils endlessly and angrily in his laboratory until it eases under the quiet tick of instruments. Spreadsheets fill one wall of the laboratory. Callipers and a frequency-receiver send their readings across it as his fingers dance across the new Matrix-housing compartment he’s built. 

It is not the first one he’s made. One has been installed into Zeta already. If he finds another promising candidate he will modify them too — and he doesn’t do so on a _whim_ with hurried components. His creations are painstakingly made down to every last measurement, shock-tested and treated until he knows even if the mech is never presented with the Matrix, it will never encumber them. 

Nominus Prime’s public injury weighs heavily on his mind. Not too long ago the Prime was attacked in a suicide bombing during the Primal Procession itself, a shockingly daring move from the Senate. Shockwave is sure that in their meeting next week Proteus will begin to hedge for the _Clampdown_. Already propaganda has filled the streets against alleged Decepticons — freedom fighters — and particularly against their figurehead, Megatron and his catchphrase: _You are being deceived_.

Shockwave’s lip curls. He knows that better than anybody. He’s consistently presented _front-row seats_ to the unravelling of Cybertron as they know it. 

His Matrix-slot holds against all tests for the third time so he places it into vacuum-storage, fifth slot, and steps through the anti-oxidiser as he leaves the lab, shaking any remaining solvents from him, removing safety equipment and tools into his subspace — magnifying helms, precision gloves — as he strides for the other squares of his Academy. 

His Academy is a place of education first and foremost. Lectures are scheduled and given by mechs he knows and trust to be capable. Its housing of outliers is the undercurrent of that. He finds most of them in the automat, chattering around tables in various friend groups, refuelling and relaxing as a break in the middle of the day. Shockwave does not enter. He merely leans in the doorway and observes. Windcharger, who walks in behind him, shoots him a questioning glance. Shockwave just tips his head slightly as a signal to _go ahead_. 

It’s disappointing that he doesn’t have to watch for very long to see Damus walking back from the dispensers with an energon cube, only to bump into Skids as he walks by. It seems like an accident, both mechs just looking the wrong way, and Skids — _Skids_ , Shockwave can’t believe it — turns around.

Skids tells him to mop it up. Damus dips his helm and goes. No other mech bats an optic at the exchange. Skids doesn't move to clean it on his own. He's ordered Damus to do it instead.

Shockwave- has to stand for a moment to compose himself. It’d been such a subtle move. A subtle reminder of their pecking order.

Skids has settled down at a table to finish his energon with Windcharger, who glances over worriedly at Shockwave. Windcharger isn’t the only one who’s noticed. By the time Shockwave is striding with palpable restrained energy across towards them, half his outliers have looked up from their energon. Shockwave doesn’t come here to refuel. He’s locked in his lab all the time. What’s the event?

He stops before Skids and Windcharger. And places one servo down on their table. 

Conversation in the room dies down. Shockwave meets their gazes and reminds himself that this is all for them, for their safety, for a justice and this building that has always been for them.

“There is a crack in everything,” Shockwave quotes levelly, “that is how the light gets in.”

His anger detonates. The other hand slams down _hard_ , and he roars, “OR ELSE THE DARK!” 

Across the automat, there is a clatter as Damus drops his cleaning supplies. The bot is staring at him as though he is radiant. “And today it is _darkness_ that I see in these bots who I’d thought the best of!” He spins around to meet the faces of Thundercracker, Skywarp, Skids, Damus, Trailbreaker, Wincharger, and then sweeps his furious gaze across the other half of the room. “You are born with talents. You are persecuted for them. This you know better than any other bot, yet I see a foolhardy _thuggishness_ among you. Why is that? Does anyone care to answer for me?”

Silence greets him back. Many of them can’t meet his optics. 

“Because it gives you a sense of power,” Shockwave says, one fist clenching. “You forget weakness if you have your own hierarchy and if there is someone superficially different that you can deem below you. But I tell you this: that mindset. Ends. _Now_.

“If you want to be capable of fighting back against the morbid, the controlling, the callous- if you want to be capable of fighting the _real_ threat against you: train! I have given you these tools. Use them! If this becomes nothing but a spawning ground for _hissing in corridors_ and threats, if any more of your _posturing_ makes your peers miserable — if any more of your _posturing_ means that _not one of you_ realises when one of your number is _gone_ again, I will be disappointed beyond RECOGNITION!”

They are ashamed. He can feel it. He doesn’t wish for them to have to be, but this is what he must resort to. His tone falls suddenly, distraught. “Each of you are important to me. Please. Don’t make me regret opening my Academy,” 

Then he says, “Skids, help Glitch clean up that energon spill. Don’t do it again.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In canon, Skywarp and Thundercracker were unhappy in the Academy because they were treated as second-rate by the grounders. I extrapolated that if they were extended that sort of treatment, Damus as an empurata victim would’ve been, too. 
> 
> End notes for each chapter will mention how its contents reference events in canon that I don't believe to be common knowledge. But the bigger canonical events, eg. the Clampdown existing in canon, won't be included here.


	2. Chapter 2

“The head of our security is weeding out culprits. In the meantime, we protect the populace by _clamping down_.”

“We will not sit idly by while _terrorists_ try to undermine our way of life. The attack on Nominus Prime will not go unpunished.”

As one of the more influential Senators, Shockwave is seated in the front row as Proteus paces and gestures with his notion of grandeur. Or perhaps not. Perhaps Proteus is fully aware of self-centred and manipulative nature of the proposal and that very knowledge brings his sadism glee. 

He uses his words — ‘terrorists’ — and wields their connotations like weapons. He directs the need for justice onto Nominus Prime, a figure they must ubiquitously support. Certainly, some justice needs to be dolled out for so grievously harming Nominus Prime, but not upon the Decepticons. 

Shockwave turns his attention to Sentinel, chief of security, the true culprit. Some mech has tapped his shoulder and is muttering about- a perimeter breach? His audial enhancers — state-of-the-art, manufactured under his own hands — hone in on the conversation and understand that there’s someone coming. A ‘visitor’ rampaging through security. 

“We’ll restrict passage across our orbital borders,” Proteus says. “We’ll round up the agitators and the dissidents. We’ll detain anyone without a valid serial code. Curfews, containment, capital punishment– whatever it takes.”

And in the hushed conversation, “Sir… I’ve been told that our ‘visitor’ has taken apart a full squadron and he’s heading this way _._ ” For what it’s worth, Sentinel doesn’t even take his optics off Proteus. 

But a quick glance around Shockwave reveals that Proteus holds general approval. Among members of the Senate is mixture of concealed anticipation, thoughtfulness, and overall: calculation. Those scattered individuals who support Decepticons are equally blatant in their reactions, horror flaring their plating as they sit ram-rod still. Shockwave can’t criticise it without being hypocritical, but in this instance he’s long anticipated the bear trap. He crosses his legs and laces his fingers together in his lap so they don’t twitch and rap in growing anger. Even anticipating the Clampdown has not afforded him the opportunity to _stop_ it. He has had his optics out, has watched unduly the actions of Proteus and others, has created Matrix-holders, has provided refuge for outliers, but it will never be enough.

“Scramble all units. Put him down.”

Sentinel has a look of focus utterly absolute. It attests to the fact that he doesn’t turn away from the speech even to address the security breach. Shockwave isn’t sure whether or not to attribute this to the unveiling of a plan that has surely been years in the making as an extension of gluttony and manufactured pride, because some gut instinct that has lead him through his life tells him that it’s _more_ than that. 

Sentinel will not look away from Proteus’ place at the stand. Perhaps, Shockwave thinks, and the suspicion strikes him as a bolt from the blue, Sentinel desires _Proteus_. Both as a caricature of power and as a mech. His fingers tighten together. It will strengthen the bond of trust between the two conspirers … and more importantly, what role does Shockwave have between that? 

The missive accepting Proteus’ proposal has yet to be sent. Shockwave knows that Skywarp may be in danger for it, and perhaps the other outliers too, but Shockwave does not want to give so much for what may simply be a _bluff_. If Shockwave can _out_ -bluff Proteus, if Proteus is not sure yet that Shockwave houses outliers, then Shockwave can walk away from the entire affair. That said, it begins to dawn on him that perhaps Proteus has his reasons for wanting to place Shockwave between him and Sentinel: to spur Sentinel into greater heights to appease him, or perhaps to deter him. 

Meanwhile, Senator Ratbat takes the podium, to great applause. 

“Senator Proteus is right. And if the Clampdown means that the general populace must forego some of their freedoms, well, it is but a small price to pay for their safety.” 

It’s unclear if it’s even possible for Ratbat to be more transparent, but Shockwave supposes his words are meant for those who are greedy but _stupid_ — for those who hardly take their duty seriously and keep only half an audial open during sessions. 

Ratbat’s grin slips into sly, his smile meant for one privately to share a secret together. “And remember: we also have an opportunity to shut down those organisations who have been hostile towards us in the past. Triple M, the Cyberutopians, the malware brigade… they should all be locked up.”

Shockwave is a klik away from leaping to his feet and telling him precisely how much of an insignificant repugnant _skid_ -stain he is for encouraging their abuse of their position when someone else storms into the Senate for him. The doors do not open so much as they are _blasted_ off their hinges and metal flies skyward as a blue mech rips into the room, sparks trailing after him, a unfamiliar body over his shoulder that he heaves onto the floor with an almighty crash.

To Shockwave’s melting horror, the mech before them is Orion Pax. 

“Esteemed members of the _113rd Cybertronian Senate,_ honourable descendants of the progenitors and custodians of the sacred primal lineage…” His plating is torn and bent, evidence of his battle into their court, yet his helm is held high. He radiates a fury of justice that has Shockwave captivated. “I want a _word_ with you.“

The Senate erupts into enraged whispers.

Sentinel bristles from his place by the upper levels’ doors. “You _dare_ interrupt the Senate in private session?”

“Evidently,” Orion snipes back, his enunciation so crisp and sharp that Shockwave lurches forwards suddenly. Something unnameable in his body twists. 

“This is Whirl. He broke the law. Associates of yours wanted me to _overlook_ that fact. I didn’t, and two good officers _died_ as a result.” His optics are bright, fiery. He raises his voice as the mutterings grow louder. “I want you to look at him and realise that even the smallest actions have consequences! You sit in session, _detached_ from the real world, giving orders designed to keep the rest of us in check. And if anyone steps out of line— if anyone thinks a _rogue thought_ — you tighten the screws.”

Although he condemns them, condemns the very place in which Shockwave is seated, Shockwave’s spark pulses with his words as though living for the first time. Pax’s passion is a low-simmering _inferno_. Shockwave has never seen the likes of it before in these stuffy halls except in himself, and even then, it is but a pale imitation.

This is the one, Shockwave realises. This is the one that he wants to give room for the Matrix to reside in. His strength overpowers the security of the Senate, yet his _mind’s_ strength is greater. He stands before them with no fear of the consequences and with all the confidence that his words are the absolute truth. Shockwave can read it in every line of his frame.

“And I didn’t even realise this until I met a miner from Tarn.” Orion’s gaze fills with scorn. “A friend who had so much to _say_ that he couldn’t find the words. A miner by _design_ but not by _choice_. He wanted the freedom to choose his own fate — not have it decided for him by a ruling elite who presumed to know best.” His battle-mask is broken; Shockwave can’t look away from his mouth with each word it forms. “Only now do I recognise the limits that you put on our freedom — and you do it because you are terrified of anything you can’t control!”

Shockwave swears that Orion sees him in the front row. His optics glide right over. And, mortifyingly, Shockwave feels himself heat, in memory of their last encounter, part of him slickening to be under the attention of such an ardent and powerful mech. 

“They have a name for us, you know. Other races, looking down, mapping our progress. They call us ‘ _autobots_ ’. I’ve often wondered about that name, and now I realise: the ‘auto’ comes from ‘automaton’— one who leads a routine, monotonous life.”

“And that’s all we are to you, isn’t it? _Automations_. Our lives ever more circumscribed, from birth to death, ignition to burnout. It doesn’t have to be like this! All of us—we could be so much more! Autobots. _Autonomous_. Freethinking! Masters of our own destiny!”

Shockwave raises a hand over his mouth in a facade of thoughtfulness, though behind it, he clenches his teeth to stifle a moan. He had been wrong. He’d assumed Orion was merely there to disparage, but Orion isn’t. He’s so much _more_. He’s arrived to _inspire_ , to single-handedly right a wrong — and although futile, his hope is _incandescent_.

His valve clenches hard on nothing because he’s leaking behind his panel, grateful for the fact that he has it manually locked shut. Charge skitters wildly in his circuits, unheard under the din because other Senators are shouting down at Orion, laughing at him, mocking him.

Yet still Orion can be heard above all of them. “As of today, as of _right now_ , I am _laying claim_ to that name.” He jerks a thumb towards himself, a paradoxically informal gesture through all his articulation. “Henceforth, I am an Autobot! And it is Autobots like me who will outlive institutions like this one unless you change your ways!”

Proteus has had enough. Sentinel reaches the ground floor and moves with two enormous security bots to remove him. 

Shockwave’s valve cycles again. The danger here to Orion is _real_ and yet he persists. He will be sent to the Institute or the Scrapyard or otherwise silenced after this. 

“My friend’s name was _Megatron_ , and he had _three questions!_ Three things he said you should _demand_ to know of any powerful institution!” They start to haul him away by the arms, suspended between them, and he does not resist except in voice. “Question one: in whose interests do you exercise your power?”

He finally puts a name to it: want. Shockwave wants him so badly that the force of it physically leaves him weak of breath. He can’t let this mech go. 

“Question _two_ : to whom are you–“ he jerks his head irritably as one of the mechs pull hard at his arm- _just let me finish-_ ”—to whom are you _accountable?_ ”

“And three-“ 

He snaps out an short grunt as they twist his arms again- “and _THREE_!” he thunders. His voice rings through the chamber and roars into an immense bellow of a crescendo, “ _HOW CAN WE GET RID OF YOU?_ ”

The lubricant of his valve sprays against the back of his panel as Shockwave _squirts_ , overloading into a shuddering mess where the whole world tilts and he is left gasping as Orion disappears out the doors. The fact that his panel is latched shut and air-tight means that nothing has leaked, but still the intensity of his reaction overwhelms him only for a moment before the uproar from the rest of the Senate drowns it out, Proteus ordering for silence again and again while Shockwave reels himself back from his daze.

“A fine show of a dissident!” Proteus calls. 

Suddenly a thought cuts through everything else, the afterglow, with succinct intensity. Shockwave has to stop Orion Pax from going straight to the smelter. Orion Pax marches to his death now as Proteus speaks.

“This is the type of volatile mech we must keep watch of — mechs who fall sway to Decepticon propaganda! Mechs who have no respect for our security! Mechs who storm into prohibited spaces simply due to their _whims_!“

Shockwave stands and stretches, raising one arm above his head and flexing all his backstruts. Optics alight on him; he knows that he draws the eye and even thoughts of interest. “You can’t criticise me if you appear significantly more _unimpassioned_ to me now, can you, Senator Proteus?” he says, and Proteus turns his attention to him like a whip. By ‘unimpassioned’, Shockwave blatantly means _boring_. He cocks his hip and tilts his helm with an air of condescension. “We’re overtime.”

With that, he starts down the aisle. 

“Senator Shockwave,” Proteus starts, his tone biting, but then Shockwave becomes aware of movement across the chamber. Dai Atlas has stood and is leaving also, and Momus, and more — Shockwave recognises them, mechs who have sided with him in the past — begin to rise from their seats. The session is over. 

As soon as he’s out of the doors he bursts into stride, swirling with camera feeds and comm. lines in a furious flurry of movement, drawing contacts from the depths of his lists of files. Sentinel has Orion Pax. He knows this and this is the only piece of information that he has at this moment. If Proteus plans to make a public example of him, Shockwave can enlist anyone, camera-crew, smelter-workers, to pull him out. If Proteus plans to lock him up, Shockwave will pull different strings to _bail_ him. Lists of enforcer stations swim across his feeds and he sorts them with terrifying exactitude. If Proteus plans to send him directly to the smelter, Shockwave will have to _get there first_.

He pays a member of security remotely to access the Senate’s feeds and scrolls through it even as he strides down its halls, pedes striking and ringing with every step. Then he back-traces the file, marks it, flags its subroutines and archives it for dissection later in the laboratory. If he can set a back-door into the security measures permanently, it will be a great boon, and make the hefty fee he paid worth even more than Orion Pax’s life.

Sentinel has Orion Pax taken out of the building entirely, out onto the side-grounds. Stasis cuffs are clamped around his wrists and he is unconscious. One of the security mechs transforms into a large prisoner-transport carrier and Orion Pax is loaded into the back just as Shockwave comes into sight. “Sentinel!” he calls across the open expanse of metal. 

“Senator,” Sentinel says, and it’s clear that he detests being called upon by Shockwave.

“This mech is an old friend of mine,” Shockwave says as he draws closer. The fabrication comes easy as liquid. “Where do you intend on you taking him?”

“That’s not within your ju–“

Shockwave’s hand snaps out and seizes Sentinel’s chin. Sentinel is much, much stronger than him — he is chief of security, after all, but if he turns a hand on Shockwave, especially on Senate grounds, the consequences will be far more dire. 

“Don’t lie to me,” he says, tone pleasant as thick and choking syrup. “If I ask you for it, it is _within my jurisdiction._ Who do you think is more well-versed in our laws: me or you? And would you like to challenge me on it?”

Sentinel’s optics burn with resentment. “Orion Pax will be temporarily detained off-site. I’m afraid this is the extent of information I can provide you.”

Shockwave cannot let him be lost in the ambiguity of ‘somewhere’. While he can take camera feeds or hire a mech to tail them, the risk is too high. What if Orion is taken to the Institute? 

Shockwave has one more trump card that he does not want to play — but will. 

Orion cannot be lost. What Shockwave has seen in him today out-classes anything he has witnessed before. 

“I know you answer to Proteus,” Shockwave says. He relinquishes his hold on Sentinel and re-edits the proposal that has been weighing so heavily on him and flicks it off into the Grid for delivering. “As it so happens, I have something he _wants_.”

> Senator Proteus,
> 
> Your proposal for courtship has been accepted, on a condition: Release the mech that your faithful runt Sentinel has currently stowed away.
> 
> Please put forth your best attempts to court me. All are equal under the eye of Primus, but I do not settle for the slobbery.
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Senator Shockwave.

He is confident this will work — Proteus is not so fearful of Orion that he will pass up Shockwave _accepting his offer for courtship_.Similarly, Shockwave hides a second barb in the message: Orion is not the only mech that Sentinel has ‘currently stowed away’.

The other is, of course, Nominus Prime. Shockwave buries the implication in it and he watches Sentinel with full confidence. If Shockwave is going to do this, he will do so with his knives out. 

Moments later, Proteus replies.

> Shockwave,
> 
> Your request has been granted. I look forwards to courting you.
> 
> Warmest Regards,
> 
> Senator Proteus.

Only several kliks later, an unconscious Orion Pax is deposited at his pedes. He’s too heavy for Shockwave to carry, so he calls for Windcharger, and meanwhile he tries to appear disinterested, because for all he knows, Proteus or any mech could be watching from the feeds. 

Windcharger is one of the most honest bots who had apologised only hours after Shockwave’s chastisement of his outliers. He’ll bring one of the Academy’s vehicles. Shockwave would call for Skids, but he doesn’t think he can look him in the optic quite yet.

Shockwave also needs to wash out his valve. Frag it all.

 

* * *

 

It should be expected that Shockwave can’t tear his gaze off Orion, though that may simply be because Orion is currently his patient. 

Wires suspended from the ceiling, monitors quietly ticking — Orion is surrounded by an audience of equipment and Shockwave is their conductor. His fingers flicker over Orion’s plating and send through manual overrides for his chest to open. Inside, it is as neatly compact as Shockwave would expect from a law officer. 

The matrix holder lies on a sterile dish to his right. He scrapes a test amount of nanites off one of Orion’s interior lines and introduces it to the metal, setting a timer as he otherwise inspects Orion’s vitals. Fuel levels are sufficient, all internal components functioning as necessary, damage from the fight concluded to be superficial at best. 

His face-mask is made out of double-treated tungsten alloy with a surprising daub of titanium, and his constituent parts are tungsten alloy, though with higher concentrations of carbon and iron. Shockwave radiates approval and strides away to his storages. Drawers open at his command like doors, a huge cascade of sliding and movement, all automated to respond to his verbal signals. They are automatically sent to the main room, where he returns and turns on the anti-oxidiser to integrate the materials. They won’t match Orion’s composition perfectly, but a test scrape over five samples tells him that Orion responds to the 28a973 mix well and he signals for more of it to brought. 

There has been no adverse reaction between Orion’s nanites and the matrix holder, he notes, and the timer shuts off. It’s set to medical standard; 95% of frame rejections occur before 15 kliks. 

After that Shockwave is a droplet in an ocean of focus, a scalpel sluicing through the sea. He has no assistants, but half his laboratory is computerised through a complex AI that shifts the anti-oxidant as he needs, presents him his tools, slides the UV-shield into place as he uses it to catalyse metal setting, and spins through sub-routines almost as efficiently as he does. In these moments Shockwave feels alive. Orion comes together under his hands, tears seamed over with new plating that is still warm from Shockwave’s improvised compilation of chemical treatment and integrated so perfectly that the original designers wouldn’t be able to distinguish it. 

The casing to fit the matrix fits into him snugly, and even in stasis Orion’s systems respond to it, lights booting up around its edges as it is accepted not as a foreign body but as part of his own. Shockwave pushes the limits of frame efficiency, editing Orion’s internals’ locations by mere nano-meters until the new upgrade has sufficient place to fold in. 

The remaining components of Orion slide into place from there. Shockwave feels the faintest stirs of satisfaction as Orion’s battle-mask cools from its heated moulding and is _better_ than new, varnished over with a chromium-titanium mix Shockwave procured as he waited for other areas of Orion’s plating to take. 

And as he sets the battle-mask into place, he begins to weave coding to his AI, a full-frame transcript of Orion’s specifications, instructions for the tens of miniature graspers that will delicately tweak Orion’s dented plating into place. All of Orion’s missing plating and holes have been filled; it is now a matter of correcting the existing metal. They descend on Orion like tiny fish, impeccable in their duty, and Shockwave follows them, checking and measuring every slot and then adding his own factor from his optic. Shockwave knows he is a fair appreciator of beauty — he follows _instinct_ to design the slightest angles to tilt and buff so that it discreetly draws the optics and places a mech’s appearance out of the standard of mechanised factory to _hand_ -sculpted.

When Orion is complete, Shockwave is practically heady with satisfaction and exhausted. Admittedly, as he looks over the images he’d taken of Orion in his battle-damaged state, that impression of a formidable and battle-hardened mech is dulled in the wake of the repair, but Shockwave thinks that he looks _more_ now. There is something latent in Orion’s structure that marks him as demandingly _authoritative,_ powerful and necessitating strength to challenge.

Although Shockwave has been deep in Orion’s insides for the last few hours, he hadn’t had an opportunity to _revel_ in his body. He allows himself a moment of indulgence by spreading a hand across Orion’s chest, above his spark, above the new slot for the Matrix. Orion’s engines hum quietly at his touch and Shockwave gives a full bodied shiver. 

He cannot forget the image of Orion in all his gleaming rage and his words that strike as deeply as any brand. 

It makes him, humiliatingly, wet again. Even though Shockwave considers himself slightly more virile than the next mech, he has never had such a potent reaction from merely _meeting_ another. It simultaneously casts his entire decision into doubt and confirmation. Perhaps it’s his body’s signal to him that Orion is indeed the Prime candidate that he has been searching for, or perhaps he sees Prime candidacy in Orion simply because he’s outrageously aroused.

They are not mutually exclusive, and Shockwave considers that this was one of the most favourable alternatives of all either way. Proteus’ proposal was a bomb counting down, and through this, Shockwave pulls most of the strings he can in one blow. He can remain ambiguous about Skywarp and Soundwave’s relation to him, he can secure Orion, and he can respond to the proposal. 

The solvent spray is shockingly cold as he steps out of the laboratory. It blasts away the specks of metallic dust and smears of oil and he tucks away all his remaining equipment on him as he looks around.

Skids is there. Shockwave had seen him from the one-way glass. “Senator,” he says respectfully.

“You know to call me Shockwave,” Shockwave says, with just the lilt of teasing.

But Skids dips his helm, unusually subservient. Shockwave feels a sharp stab of guilt. Skids had been the target of his ire during his eruption in the automat. 

“I’ll just call to get my project picked up,” he says instead, meaning Orion. “How about this — I take you to refuel. Dinner?”

“I’d love to,” Skids says. Shockwave steps back into his laboratory where the equipment is already being cleaned under a blaster. Windcharger comes to take Orion to the nearest Enforcer station not long after; he’ll tell them that he’d merely found Orion on the side of the street, and Shockwave removes the medically induced stasis just after Wincharger takes him away. Orion will eventually be delivered back to his home.

Skids has been watching patiently for him all the while, and when Shockwave finally emerges again with apologies, he seems happy to let it go. Shockwave suspects that it’s because Skids is relieved that he’s not upset. 

They haven’t spoken since the automat debacle. Shockwave feels negligent. 

As it is, they take a shuttle — non-sentient, obviously — towards and eatery that is the average of their classes. Skids fills up the space talking about theories of Damus’ ability, and Shockwave notes that this is his roundabout way of apologising to the empurata victim specifically. 

“-some physical manifestation of _resentment_ , it feels like. They’re all affected when we hit emotional turmoil, but his is so specifically centred around pain that I can’t help wondering about it when I’ve been working with him.“

“If you gave this as a lecture, mechs would flood in for the religious undertones,” Shockwave notes. Light catches along the intensity of his expression, the city passing by through the window. If it weren’t for the fact that senators did not use alt-modes they would drive on their own. 

“Religious?” Skid looks puzzled for a moment. “I’d say that this more far-reaching than religious. How would it affect those who follow Primus?”

“I say this less as for Primus than _enlightenment_ and the nature of belief or faith itself. If we even imply that emotions can result in some ability-“ Naturally, Shockwave thinks of Dai Atlas. 

“No, no, the circumstances have to be absolutely critical, and _negative_ , I’ve noticed.” Skid’s mouth twists. “I’ve pointed them towards stress-induced for now.”

“Oh,” Shockwave says. His optics shutter. “Have you asked where they have come from?”

“No, but–“

“–but it’s evident, isn’t it.”

They stew over that for a moment. Shockwave, obviously, knows as great deal about where each of his outliers originated from because he was the one who found them all, individually. At the time it had been too great a task to intrust upon anybody. None of their pasts are recorded in their files out of sheer respect, and Shockwave is quite confident that he is the only one privy to them. 

“I should ask,” Skids says, fingers clacking together. 

“Don’t press,” Shockwave warns.

“I won’t. But what is it about _stress_ , exactly? Why not happiness? It seems like a counter-productive thing for mechs to seek out to enable any sort of power — not that the general public should. They absolutely shouldn’t. The outliers are all _born_ with their abilities, but stress seems to develop it.”

“Look the other way,” Shockwave says. “Rather than induced from seeking the ability itself, it is borne _from_ stress.”

“Oh– Hmm.” 

Shockwave leans forward. “Consider it a physiological imperative. During times of greatest strain, a mech’s frame is pushed to the limits. If they’re already capable of some sort of talent, we see it manifesting more tangibly to deal with the strain. In fact, we witness this on a macroscopic scale around us _right now_. Historically, during periods of war, of strain, technology has experienced its highest rate of development — this should strike you as a parallel.”

Skids’ doorwings flick. “Do we really want to talk about the war?”

Compared to all the subtlety that surrounds Shockwave on a daily basis, senators attempting to direct conversations towards their subjects of interest so they can gauge Shockwave’s opinions and thus weigh him for his usefulness to them — this is so blatant that it makes Shockwave laugh. Skids’ optics crinkle at the corners in response. “We’ll have to, won’t we?” Shockwave says. He gestures out the window. “It’s already here. It beats on our front doors while we gossip behind its back like _spiteful_ old friends.”

“Or right into its audials,” Skids says. His body language is relaxing now, more often as they fall into familiar stride. “You know my friend who is close with Senator Decimus-“

“Your friend with the poor taste,” Shockwave says.

“–Well, he says the same to _me_. But Senator Decimus talks about you often. I heard about what happened today already. There was a dissenter and then you stood and left?”

“I make grand entrances. Surely I take grand exits, too.”

Skids snorts inelegantly. “I think — or at least my friend thinks — Decimus is obsessed with you.” He says it with a clear discomfort. It’s not the first time he’s mentioned it. “You really should be more careful.”

“It’s a klik too late for _that_. I’ve already stepped my pede into the rat trap.” The calculation flashes through his mind quickly. It’ll be manipulative, no doubt in that, and Shockwave resents his next words. “Proteus is courting me.”

Stillness floods their shuttle carriage like shards of ice. “Sorry, could you repeat that?”

“I asked you to go to the Academy last week, if you recall. That was due to a message from him.” Shockwave taps against the glass almost idly. “He has an optic turned to my Academy and the firepower to _back_ it. I thought it best to dance to his tunes for now.”

“Shockwave, Senator _Proteus_ –“

“-I’m only too aware of his nature,” Shockwave says. There is no warning that Skids can give that Shockwave doesn’t know. “I can’t say that I know precisely what awaits me with it, but Skids, despite everything, you have always been my theoretical and intellectual second in command. If I vanish as abruptly as Soundwave, I know you’ll carry on my work.”

A lack of response has Shockwave looking up. Skids is staring at him as though, through all his theories, Shockwave has managed to surprise him. He gathers himself quickly. “He hasn’t vanished _entirely_. We found a trail for Soundwave — he’s been moved off world.”

“Do we know where?” It’s a relief, a fear he hadn’t dare entertain. Soundwave hasn’t been killed. He hasn’t been sent to the Institute.

“Somewhere near sector twelve, but we’re still working on tracing back the footage or trying to find a transmission that told him to leave.”

“It’s likely I’ll discover traces when I tail Sentinel,” Shockwave says. “His influence runs deep into all of these plots — and I intend to _unearth_ him.”

“I know you know this, but it’s _dangerous_ , Senator. You’re picking fights with both Proteus and Sentinel, and it’s never turned out so well for anyone in the past.”

“Have we returned to ’Senator’?” Shockwave asks, half-teasing.

Skids is silent. His doorwings shift again in vague skittishness. “I don’t— no, Shockwave, not that I’m not honoured, but I _can’t_ be in charge of the Academy alone if someone… _removes_ you. You’ve seen that I can’t be.”

“No one will assassinate me, Skids,” Shockwave says. “I’m too significant of a target for that to happen. Nonetheless, if I _am_ inhibited, you are fully capable. You prove this to me just by being here today.”

Shockwave taps against the glass again, prompting Skids’ attention to the district surrounding them. They’ve arrived. The shuttle is slowing.

“The pay is on me,” Shockwave says. Whether he means for the decision or their outing is ambiguous.

 

* * *

 

Even the back of Orion’s helm and shoulders are recognisable to Shockwave for all time he’s spent pouring over Orion’s files. This is, he realises, the first time Orion will speak to him, mech on mech. Their previous meetings have been _meetings_ rather than conversations.

Orion is early. Shockwave is just on time. The Ark-1 memorial stands tall in the centre of the building opposite where Orion is seated on the bench, and Shockwave spares it a glance as he takes a seat beside Orion. 

The sensation is heady, foreign, like being a new-spark and nearing a potential partner for the first time. Shockwave cannot bring himself to look Orion in the eye. Instead he leans back, resting his arms against the back of the bench and tipping his helm to the other side. Their arms are close enough for Shockwave to feel Orion’s heat.

“Thank you for agreeing to see me,” Shockwave says. 

“It’s the least I could do. I gather that I owe you my freedom.”

Orion has his arms resting on his knees and is looking down, in contrast to Shockwave who appears relaxed but in reality isn’t. He seems very much the contemplative hero.

“It wasn’t easy,” Shockwave says, after a pause, thinking about Proteus. “But I wouldn’t see a mech of your caliber get locked up in Garrus-1 — or sent to the Institute.”

“You’re a _senator_ ,” is what Orion replies. “You were in the crowd when I… held forth.” He tips his helm up, following the pose of Ark-1 in its final flight. It’s interesting that he doesn’t look at Shockwave either. “Why did you save me after my diatribe? Was it because of our _prior meeting_?”

Shockwave certainly can’t answer that question completely honestly. The memory of Orion staring him down as he has come all over his faceplates is not something he will forget soon. “No, but because you were right. And because you were _wrong_. The Senate is worse than you’ve been led to believe. The attack on Nominus Prime was orchestrated by factions within the Senate itself, not that I can prove it— yet.”

Orion looks at him then, his gaze stern. “If that’s true, why would they do that?” 

“So they had an excuse to move him into hiding. So they’d have _unfettered access_ to the Matrix to study it and discover how it creates life.”

“The Matrix can create _life_?” Orion surprised is a charming sight, his audials straightening to attention, his optics widening. It’s refreshingly genuine. 

There are two known ways of sparking — or one known honestly by the general public. Vector Sigma ignites hot-spots across Cybertron from which newsparks are born, given protometal, and develop into their shapes as Forged mechs.

The other is to be _constructed cold_. To the public it was called ‘spark splicing’ and explained that a Forged spark ignited another. Shockwave is unsure why they pursued the cover story because all he knows is that it was in some way tied to the _Matrix_ — and that it was halted. He’s voted and lobbied for its resurrection, not for the sake of producing more mechs, not if the impending energon crisis would only be exacerbated if the population rose, but for the sake of digging into this _secret_.

There is no other known way of creating life, and creation is the most precious of all things.

“The Knights of Cybertron called it the Creation Matrix. If certain members of the Senate can control the Matrix, they can control _anything_.” He tips his helm as if to shake it. “Their grasps for power reach farther than you can fathom. Battle-lines are being drawn, and they cut deeply enough to threaten to cleave this world into _two_. Civil unrest and war stirs under our pedes like a beast awakening.”

“You haven’t answered where I fit into all of this,” Orion says, unreasonably astute. 

As much as he wants to stay with Orion, it currently doesn’t make _sense_ to. Shockwave stands. “You’re a law officer. Keep doing your work. Don’t worry, I’ll be in touch.” Shockwave is undoubtably and undeniably attracted to him, but that doesn’t warrant _over-staying_ because, as of now, there is nothing Orion can do but continue as he always has — with the added knowledge that Shockwave is supporting him. If Shockwave can manage to get his hands on the Matrix, then Orion will be so much more.

“Wait!” Orion rises too and puts his hands on Shockwave’s shoulders to stop him leaving, grip gently firm because he _knows_ Shockwave is a senator, softer and lighter than him, but still with the weight and the daring to put his hand on a _senator_. Shockwave can feel the charge jumping in his circuits from the touch alone. Some tank deep inside him clenches. “Before you go— I feel different. _Physically_. You did more than just _repair_ me, didn’t you?” Orion’s gaze lacks suspicion; it is not an accusation. 

“You can argue for that,” Shockwave says, “and you can argue against that. I would say that I repaired you just as you always _have been_. You’re a deep thinker, Orion. Next time you’re alone, I suggest you reflect on what’s occurred over the past few days.” He lifts Orion’ hand off him with his own and feels his world centre down to that one touch. “You ask what your role is within all this — look inside yourself, and you may find the answer.”

He is confident that Orion will recognise the hold for the Matrix for what it is.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the panels where they’re talking on the bench, Shockwave does indeed have his legs crossed, and he's looking away when he first says 'thank you for agreeing to see me'. Orion does put a hand on his shoulder to stop him leaving. 
> 
> Most of the dialogue between them has been retained. Matrix creating life _is_ a conversation they had. 
> 
> Most of the dialogue in the Senate session has also been retained. 
> 
> Stress-induced power mutations is something brought up in the far future, albeit with a few other conditions.
> 
> To clarify: mech preg here is _not_ a known way of creating life. It's never happened before. I hope you understand where this story is going.


	3. Chapter 3

The trace works. The mech that Shockwave had bought the footage off of had been too much of a novice to scrub the names of the files in their root folders, and Shockwave, now knowing what he has to look for, pries open the surveillance network of the Senatorial chamber like a mnenosurgeon with a willing head.

He downloads it all onto a public floating data-base and pursues it freely, leaving it playing in the background while he works on his seeding project. Hours of Sentinel and members of his security staff walking around, smaller name senators speaking with each other, long stretches of silence and no movement — this is what most of the footage consists of. Shockwave considers building a recognising filter for Proteus’ appearances. Would it be worth the effort, or would he end up watching it all manually either way to follow Sentinel?

The days play backwards on twenty times speed from the most recent then the one before that. His central processor is pushed above 50% for the first time in _years_ and Shockwave can hardly contain the elated rush of it. His optics do not blink. He simultaneously works on building his energon-seeds while analysing, filtering and recording the significant footage through his processor. 

He commands the camera-reel to slow when something particularly catches his optic. Shockwave focuses fully to see Sentinel on the upper decks of the Senate. It isn’t in session; the stands are empty. A blurred blue form below seems to be Proteus speaking to another senator. But above them, unnoticed, Sentinel is leaning against the wall, one hand stuffed into his mouth, face-plates flushed, the other hand wetly fingering his valve. 

How didn’t anyone _delete_ this? How didn’t Sentinel? Shockwave could laugh. Then he is painfully reminded of the fact that he overloaded in the stands as well and tamps down on the hypocrisy of it. 

He supposes no mech manually watches through the footage. No mech has enough time, and no mech that is of low enough class to _have_ enough time would be permitted to sort and organise through it all. 

Sentinel in the footage overloads silently, spike twitch across his torso. Shockwave marks the timestamp, re-winds, and creates a duplicate of the clip. He’s not sure it’s something he can use to incriminate either Proteus or Sentinel, but if he gathers accumulation of evidence, if Proteus doesn’t already _know_ , perhaps he can use it in some way. To prove the compromise of objectivity? Anything is useful. Shockwave just has to see it. 

This is the moment, of course, that he receives a comm. from Proteus, and for an irrational moment he thinks that somehow Proteus has had the footage _bugged_ and that he knows — though the technological nuance of this would take even Shockwave months to complete, if it isn’t impossible entirely — but the message is of no relevance to Shockwave’s invasion of security. It’s a request to establish a comm. link. 

Shockwave mutes the footage and accepts. All his transmissions leaving the Academy are triple-encoded and beyond even _military_ standards. If it’s an attempt at subterfuge, it’s a poor one. 

“Shockwave,” Proteus says. His tone is filled with the same faux-warmth that Shockwave has heard him take countless times when attempting to tide over allies. The show disgusts Shockwave. They’ve never even _been_ on first name terms. “I’d like to spend some time with you today. This evening, perhaps. I’m sure your schedule can afford this.”

“I’d planned to spend it in my Academy, mentoring students and researching,” Shockwave says. He knows it won’t be so easy, and he cannot avoid Proteus forever.

“I can visit, if you’d like.”

Over Shockwave’s beheaded corpse. “That won’t be necessary. I’m afraid there aren’t many suitable _date_ locations within my Academy. That isn’t its purpose.”

Proteus pauses then at the word ‘date’. Shockwave has thrown him a knot to unravel. He can pick and pry at it all he likes, but Shockwave has no real intent behind it — unless Proteus interprets it as an invitation to blatantly romantically pursue Shockwave, though he considers that a minimal loss. The rules of a courtship are not so rigidly defined. If Proteus wished to pursue actual romantic advances on Shockwave, nothing would bar him in the _first place_. That aside, Shockwave doesn’t think _romance_ is what Proteus is actually looking for.

“Come to my home, then. I know you don’t take too kindly to visitors — consider this a gift of my well-meaning.”

Either location will be just as insufferable. “I’ll be there. Give me an hour to take my leave.”

Proteus’ parting words before disconnecting the comm are, “I look forward to seeing you.” 

His attempt at _sultry_ physically stops Shockwave and he braces against purging protocols. Then he raises a hand to his face and places it over his optics. Vents. 

He’ll be walking straight into Proteus’ domain. But Proteus can’t hurt him. He reminds himself of this. Proteus can’t lay a finger on him — because Shockwave will be recording every last moment of it and _that_ he will use to smear Proteus’ reputation through the floor. In fact, Shockwave invites it. He realises that he _wants_ to taunt Proteus into hurting him, because if it’s spread that Senator Proteus would beat the mech he’s courting, it will stir the Senate and the public into uproar. 

Proteus _can’t interface_ with him either. A courting is supposed to end with interface and spark-bond. It’s some asinine old-fashioned notion of chastity that Shockwave now approves of. If Proteus breaks it, Shockwave will pry at it as an excuse to break off the courtship on _legal_ grounds. This can also be slipped out into the public eye for disapproval against Proteus, but Shockwave is less willing to do that.

No, Shockwave should not be afraid for himself. On most fronts he is protected. His largest concern should be to protect _information_. Proteus would gather information by following Shockwave, trying to over-charge him, trying to coax it out of him. For the most part, particularly because Proteus is not visiting _Shockwave’s_ home, Shockwave has an advantage here. 

As he’s been thinking, he’s cleared the tools and equipment away. The laboratory is back to its familiar neatness, empty bench tops and solvent clearing to in sinks where instruments have been washed. 

Shockwave steps out into the halls with the usual spray of anti-contaminant solvent. He had accepted this challenge on his own volition. He should not be afraid. There is no reason for fear; it’ll only cast him into suspicion. Shockwave has never been held back by fear — _he_ is the one who fights against the Senate both overtly and and covertly. 

Proteus’ address is common knowledge. A shuttle takes him to a station nearby and he walks a short distance to Proteus’ estate, which towers into the sky with all the opulence of some absurd trophy, a myriad of swirls and elaborate carvings decorating the walls like vines.

Shockwave has never visited before; Proteus isn’t the type to hold parties. Through the courtyard he walks, guards nodding at him as he passes. He spots timid camera-classes distantly up on the walls, wonders if they’re chained there, then wonders if they have any information they’d be willing to relinquish. 

The path carries him to the front door, where between two pillars Proteus is waiting for him. His plating gleams, clearly freshly polished, and his smile is light. Behind him Shockwave can see the hints of a lavish foyer.

“Senator Proteus,” Shockwave says, and gives a shallow bow. “Thank you for your invitation.”

“Now, Shockwave, there’s no need to be so _stiff_. Come in.” Proteus extends a hand. Shockwave eyes it warily. The pause stretches between them, Shockwave unwilling to take the offered limb, but then Proteus has enough of the wait and grabs his shoulder instead — not roughly enough to dent — and steers him through the front door. 

They are met with marble and platinum. Gold trimmings line the display cabinets and paintings look down from every wall, immense across the high-ceiling rooms. Proteus’ hold on his shoulder is like an anchor. His smile has not moved. “This one I procured from off-world. Luna-12. Isn’t it just marvellous?” He talks about the art as they pass dow a hallways towards a shimmering elevator. _Everything_ glimmers, all the metal buffed to shining and/or crusted with jewels.

Shockwave makes vague sounds of interest. His processor is mapping out every step he takes, formatting blueprints.

The elevator is a kaleidoscope because of its mirrored interior, even its ceiling, though it is rimmed with an unbroken trail of embedded lights. When Shockwave looks to his left, he can see Proteus watching him in the reflection. “Gorgeous,” Proteus says, and the hand on his shoulder strokes down Shockwave’s arm. Shockwave wants to throw him off and snap at him to keep his hands to himself, but he doesn’t. 

If Proteus is trying to make him uncomfortable, easier to pry at, it’s _working_. Shockwave’s ire roars inside him. The entire place is an overindulgence in luxury and Proteus is treating him as an extension of property.

A sitting-room opens up, filled with burgundy and dark gold. Opposite the door, a window the length of the entire wall spans. Shockwave is not impressed. His own home is in the upper floors. The view of the city spiralling out beneath them is not one that is new. If anything, it is detestable. All the opulence is detestable. 

Proteus guides him to a cushioned chair. It faces a short table and another identical chair, and there are already two empty energon flutes prepared, though the bottle beside them has not been opened yet. “This could all be yours,” Proteus says, and it’s unclear whether he refers to his home or the city outside, “if you accept to become my Conjunx. We could do incredible things together.”

“And this is your definition of incredible?”

“My vision of ‘incredible’ is a _safe_ Cybertron,” Proteus says, his optics burnished with sincerity. Shockwave is not fooled. “One where this security around my home is unnecessary. One where Nominus Prime is not attacked in broad daylight by terrorists. One where mechs _know_ their future, know it from birth, and are not plagued with the fear of uncertainty. This is my vision for Cybertron — and Shockwave, I want you by my side.”

“I find myself questioning that,” Shockwave says flatly. “We’ve never been on very good terms.”

“And how _unfortunate_ that is. I apologise so deeply for our unfavourable beginnings, but your intelligence is invaluable, Shockwave. Imagine if you were the one working on our _sky spies_. As they are, they are large, noticeable, and ugly on the optic if we want them in the streets. I have seen your creations, Shockwave.” Proteus leans forwards breathlessly. “They’re all magnificent. Your beauty extends to your _servos_. With your aid, this vision of a safe Cybertron would be closer than ever.”

At the very least, now Shockwave has some idea of what Proteus wants. If that can be called progress.

“Then why go to these lengths?” Shockwave asks, gesturing around him. “If you want my aid, _listen_ during Senatorial sessions. _Listen_ to what _I’m_ trying to achieve — the sooner you recognise that I want nothing of wealth, and that my methods for developing a world of safety are radically different to yours, _then_ we can cut this chase. There’s no need to court me.”

“There is. Because you are beautiful,” Proteus says. Shockwave inwardly boggles. It is the crudest lie he has ever heard. Proteus couldn’t have put this all into play because he thinks Shockwave is beautiful. “You’ve never been to any of Ratbat’s mixers, Shockwave, but it is widely agreed among them that you are the most desirable of mechs within our ranks. Your fins, your wings, the ever-changing palette of your paint… it’s able to capture even the most stoic of mechs. Even me.”

So is it a _power play_? Has the intent not been to get Shockwave’s aid — because that, frankly, is impossible, and Proteus should know it — but to let others see that Shockwave is, in some way, aligned with him? It seems like a nonsense move, because Shockwave _is_ his biggest threat. Unless he believes Dai Atlas is? “I admire the flattery, but I would never accept being someone’s _conquest_ ,” Shockwave says.

“I said I desired you to be at my side, not below me,” Proteus says, much to Shockwave’s frustration. “This is a courtship. I will prove to you that my ideas are worth knowing and that you are worthy of my pursuit. Come with me to Ratbat’s party — in two months. It is an event of immense scale. I _will_ prove to you the sincerity of my proposition there. We have all the time in the world.”

Behind Proteus, on the other side of the room, there is a painting hanging above a desk. It is of Proteus himself, sitting regally. His gold highlights and the chevron marking him as a senator have been accented sharply.

“I’m sure we do,” Shockwave says, hiding bitterness.

 

* * *

 

When he returns to his apartment, it is with relief. He runs a full scan for any bugs on him, and, when he’s satisfied there are none, collapses into the seat by his console. The firmness and familiarity of it washes out the memory of sitting in that _chair_ for hours. The city has long gone dark by now, and when Shockwave glances out the window, it is only to a landscape of lights and silhouettes. 

Spending time with Proteus is a challenge all on its own. Proteus had proceeded to walk through his past _conquests_ , proffering to talk about art in attempt to appear cultured, the paintings of battles, how he’d haggled down prices, the romanticised and rose-tinted stories he’d heard of them — and Shockwave himself had said very little. The entire thing is nonsensical. Proteus isn’t _stupid_. Shockwave knows this. He’s seen Proteus outmanoeuvre and send opponents into ruins; so what is all this supposed to be?

Shockwave wishes he could go to the pleasure house and get fucked until morning, because he knows this toiling and deduction will get him nowhere. At the very least he could take his processor off the ramping stress. But the risk of being found now, fraternising, is too high. Previously, if any mech caught word, it wouldn’t be too horrible a scandal — everyone had their kinks, and it wasn’t as though Shockwave’s was harmful. As a mech in an active courtship, however, it is completely unacceptable. 

Primus, he can still feel Proteus’ unwelcome hands on him. Grabbing him. Pushing him down the halls. _Stroking_ him as though he were some expensive sculpture to purchase and mount on a wall. 

Shockwave shudders, pressing himself into the chair as though to escape invisible roaming hands. 

The thought of _Orion_ strikes him from nowhere. Orion holding his shoulder instead. 

Before he knows it, in an impulsive move, he’s trying to establish a comm. link to Orion. He surprises even himself, caught in indecision as the call is patching through between _hang up_ and _keep going_ but then before he can come to a conclusion, Orion picks up. “Senator? Is there an issue?”

“I hadn’t expected you to be awake,” Shockwave says. Blurts, more like, in attempt to delay answering the question. “Do your working hours typically extend this late?”

“Not usually, no, but I prefer overtime. I’m on my way home,” Orion says, and now that Shockwave is paying attention to more than his voice, he can hear some sort of rhythmic clacking and rumbling that must be the sound of public commute. 

He’s speaking to Orion. _Orion_. The notion somehow bowls him over every time. “Tell me about art, Orion.”

“Art?” His puzzlement is palpable, but Orion doesn’t question the request further. “There isn’t much art a mech of my rank can access. There are prose verses I _have_ enjoyed, but I wouldn’t be able to cite them to you here because they aren’t appropriate.” Orion means _inflammatory_ works, as suggestive as it may have sounded. He’d mentioned Megatron during his speech, and certainly, Shockwave is familiar with what Megatron writes. “What’s this for, Senator?”

“It’s nothing particularly important. Feel free to hang up if you wish. I’ve had an eventful evening, and I’m looking for... a detour, if you will.”

“You’re interested in my day,” Orion says. Perhaps Shockwave imagines the amusement in it. “Why not go for your _usual pastime?_ ”

“I can’t; not anymore.”

A pause. The rattle of the train carriage. “I apologise. Is that my fault?”

“No,” Shockwave says, even though it is, because a significant motivation for accepting Proteus’ proposal was the fact that Orion would be freed, “not particularly. Don’t worry about it — it didn’t matter much.”

“In that case,” Orion says, and Shockwave can almost hear him re-adjusting in his seat, “my work is not usually so demanding — though now I’m down _three officers_ and my station is still in tatters.”

Shockwave lets Orion’s voice wash over him, feels something in him unwind and relax. His fingers drift. He could make music out of Orion’s voice, or…

“I have Roller working with me, but the workload is high. I prefer to oversee every arrest and case _personally_. While Whirl’s incident opened my optics to the corruption rampant in your Senate, it also brought my attention to the corruption in my _own_ offices.”

Shockwave has a hand over his mouth. The other is playing around the edges of his valve that is already fully flushed, the small node atop it glowing with charge.

It’s so risky. It’s idiotically risky. But the energon is roaring in his ears and he trusts that the noise of the train will cover any of his. Shockwave belatedly classifies himself as an utter pervert and deviant. For him, the weight of reward outclasses the risk. Even if he’s caught, Orion doesn’t have to contact him again except for professional deeds. Hopefully. He knows Orion is disciplined enough to keep the two lives seperate. It’ll make their interactions awkward, but it won’t _sabotage_ their cause.

On second thought, it’s one of the most poor lust-driven choices Shockwave has made. He feels like Proteus. He feels greasy, but it still doesn’t stop him from sinking in just the tip of a finger into his valve where it’s _soaking_ wet. The heat radiating off it throbs with his spark-beat. He slides it in deeper, trying to hold back the pace so that Orion won’t hear the slick sounds of his folds parting and kissing together. His thumb teases the node, and his third finger dips in and out of his valve. 

His spike has pressurised and drools against his torso. He wants to touch it, but doesn’t trust taking away the hand at his mouth because the shortness of his breath will give him away. 

“I’m the _Captain_ of my squadron,” Orion is still saying. “A few more hours of my time to ensure that some mechs’ lives aren’t being _ruined_ is nothing. Today there was an arrest addressed to a troublemaker at the local steel-forger’s. When I arrived on the scene to thoroughly investigate, the steel-forger’s own warrant was illegitimate and his shipments came from underpaid and exploitative labour. The troublemaker was also attempting theft — they were _both_ criminals in their own rights.”

Orion pauses. There is the sound of the train announcing a station, the doors opening, and then, “Senator?”

“Yes?” Shockwave forces out, voice much more breathier than he’d like. His fingers freeze in their movements. He swears the thud of his spark is audible. Slickness seeps, incriminatingly, down his hand. 

“Just ensuring that you were still listening,” Orion says. Shockwave tips his head back at the fresh wave of arousal it brings. Orion’s _voice_. “Both the steel-forger and the troublemaker took off down the streets of Rodion to hide with their respective gangs, and while I took care of the band of _thieves_ , I was forced to return to continue pursuit of the illegal trade tomorrow when more officers will be on duty.”

The sounds change, then. A door opening and shutting. Orion’s words suddenly echo far more. The background noise of the train vanishes. Shockwave doesn’t think about it too deeply because he’s fingering his demanding node and rubbing at it, legs parting further in his seat. Lubricant clings to his digits. He bites down against his hand to stop himself from moaning, or, worse, whimpering Orion’s name. “Imagine my surprise when I return to the station,” Orion says. “And I see a debauched and dripping senator there in my seat, touching himself while he _calls_ me.”

Shockwave’s spark physically stops. The rest of his body seizes. His in-vent is loud, surprised, and completely damning. 

He’d underestimated his own comm. systems. He’d underestimated Orion. He’d let the lust override rationality. His microphones are _state of the art_ — of course they would pick up even the smallest of sounds. Idiotic, idiotic-

“Well?” Orion asks, and his voice has dropped a whole octave more than Shockwave can even believe. His back bows involuntarily at the low growl of it, and the whine he clamps down on is undoubtably heard through the call. “Are you going to explain yourself, _Senator_?”

There is a faint tremor running through Shockwave’s struts. His processor is completely blank. Shockwave is _never_ without contingency plans, but suddenly he has nothing. “I… hadn’t planned this,” he says. 

“Yet here you are, shoving those long white fingers of yours into your valve. Tell me— is it still green?” 

He _remembers_ what Shockwave’s valve looked like. Shockwave feels like he’s no longer in his body. Orion couldn’t possibly be reciprocating. “Gold. It’s gold,” he pants. He forgoes any sense of subtlety now, and plunges his fingers in with all the abandon that he’d been holding back. Its squelching feels loud in the stillness of his room. “Matches my paint.”

Orion’s own breath jumps as though surprised Shockwave gave up the information so readily. Now that Shockwave listens, he can hear Orion too, his vents coming louder than before, the sound of something slick moving from the other end of the line. “I find this needy senator hiding there in my office,” Orion clenches out, “and I lift him onto my desk, paperwork be damned. He’s surprised to see me there, but he doesn’t protest — especially not when I push my fingers into him, so _soft_ and _wet_.”

“Mnh–!“ Shockwave is nearing the edge. He abuses his little nub, rolling it between two fingers with his free hand while he shoves in another finger. Whimpers and breathless gasps fall steadily from him. “Orion!”

“I don’t even need to give him my _spike_.” Orion’s panting is loud now, loud and obvious, drawing out all these words that coalesce into a clear image of Shockwave sopping and open for him. “All he needs are my fingers. He doesn’t need my spike pressing against his valve, the tip pushing against his node — any sudden move from either of us and it’ll slide _into_ you.”

Shockwave curls into a tight ball, draws his legs up to his chest and spurts transfluid and lubricant as the overload smashes into him like a tidal front. His audials short out completely; his world blanches with white. Whatever noise he makes is obscene, because with a sharp gasp of his name Orion hurtles into overload straight after him. 

His fingers are shaking from the intensity of the charge he’d just released. The room comes gradually back into focus: the darkness of the city outside, the shadows of objects on his desk, the dampness of the seat below him. Somehow he feels as though he is still missing the last step that confirms he’s witnessing reality. He will wake somehow and realise that this has all been a dream.

“I might have to arrest you,” Orion vents in his audials, “because that was utterly _criminal_ , Senator.”

“Arrest me and make good on your promise?” To have Shockwave bent over his desk, Orion’s spike smearing all across his valve and threatening to dip in. 

Orion grunts. Or perhaps it’s a bitten-off groan. “If you want to go another round, I’m afraid I _can’t_. The delayed case on the illegal trade was true. I don’t want to be in tomorrow on several _kliks_ of sleep to hunt criminals.”

Shockwave glances at his chronometer. “It’s not that late.”

“I left the train as soon as I realised what you were doing. I’m in an empty bathroom stall.” That explains the door and the echos. Warmth flushes through Shockwave to know that he was able to spur Orion to such desperation. “I still have to get _back_ on the next train. This isn’t my stop.”

“I can call a shuttle for you.”

“By the time it gets here, the train will’ve arrived. There’s no need.”

“However should you make up the time between now and then?”

“Senator,” Orion warns. “So help me, I will–“

“ _Orion_ ,” Shockwave gasps to cut him off. He arches his back and brings his hand to his spike. It’s not difficult to bring charge crackling to the surface again. “You know, when I saw you in that courtroom,“ he spreads his valve, which is pliant and giving now, “I _overloaded_  in my seat in front of all those other mechs — and they never even knew.” There is a muffled in-vent over the line. “You were so brilliant, so gorgeous, so demanding and brave that I could hardly bear it. Orion, what I’d give to have you here now. I’m wet enough that you could just my legs and start fragging me however hard you’d like.”

“You’re going to be the death of me, Senator,” Orion says. He sounds slightly breathless. Shockwave can recognise the background noise of conversation, though, and understands Orion’s on the station platform. “I need to get on this train.”

“I’m not stopping you,” Shockwave murmurs. “Why not ride a few stops further down the line? My home should be near the end. Ride up to my apartment and you’ll see me. I have my pedes up on my desk, apart. You could kneel before the chair and frag me open on your tongue until I overload again.”

“Senator.” Orion’s voice is laced with taut restraint. “I’m hanging up. If I listen any longer, I _will_ turn up at your front door or publicly embarrass myself.”

Shockwave just laughs as the comm. link drops. He’s alone in his apartment but the memory of Orion is tangible and lingering. He can still imagine Orion flushed behind the face-mask and there with him and making those delectable noises as he braces himself against the wall of some public stall. The image warps into Orion pushing Shockwave down against his desk. Riding his spike up against the folds of Shockwave’s valve and just rocking it there, up and down the curve of his aft. 

Shockwave moans and overloads again. 

Reciprocity is possibly the worst outcome. He’s supposed to be in a courtship. Yet here he is.

 

* * *

 

“-number of total energon mines, their outputs, and estimated total remaining reserves. If you’re interested in how this data was collected, you may see me after this presentation. As for the abridged version: this was an average across multiple independent studies, peer-reviewed and published across the years. A few of you may even recognise your own work in here. It has been referenced accordingly. I will publish this presentation into the public shortly.”

Mechs of all shapes and sizes are in the stands, scientists and members of the public, wealthy and/or interested individuals, representatives from corporations around the globe; Shockwave speaks at one of the annual largest scientific gatherings. 

“We see the sustainability of energon begin to fall by 130v; and by sustainability I refer to the rate at which it is used outpacing the rate at which it _replenishes_. This—“ he pulls up another graph on the enormous projector behind him, smiles up at the projector-class all the way at the back of the hall who follows his cues perfectly, “—exacerbates by 150v, and here in 170v, it has dipped sharply.” 

He looks at the gathered crowds. “This may or may not be a new finding to you. Opinion varies from location to location — but my primary purpose here today isn’t _just_ to prove to you that we have an impending energon crisis in our servos.”

The projector flashes to the next slide.

“This is the number of new-sparks released by Vector Sigma. This data has been complied from the International Federation of Sparking and cross-referenced with various independent sources across various geographical locations. It is also _public_ dataavailable to every city. You may access itself if you wish. The number of new-sparks that Vector Sigma releases is no secret, considering the great celebration and ceremony that surrounds it, and so it should be known that the numbers are _dwindling_.

“I have places these graphs side-by-side for your comparison. Falls in energon sustainability and periods of great strain are seen to _correlate_ with dips in sparkling numbers in the next vorn. The slow decline is mirrored; the fall around 170v is _reflected_. I know I may face skeptics here in this audience, where you may wish to attribute these similarities to another cause under the grounds that correlation does not equal causation, but if you choose to look into the International Database of Affairs, you’ll find that no other relevant event, rate, or item listed there follows this trend so closely. Not even the general price trends of products relying on energon, because the oligopolies involved in the distribution of it have, for the most part, have stabilised the inflation into a steady rise instead.”

“The explanation that comes to me is this: Vector Sigma is _responding_ to the energon that remains to us. We can consider this from a _preservation_ aspect. In times that there is little energon, why _would_ Vector Sigma choose to release many sparks simply to starve? Vice versa: in times of great abundance, why not increase the population?”

The mechs are all still watching him now. This is not like the Senate, where every mech is mulling over their own agenda. This here is where mechs come to _learn_ , to hear the finding of their fellow researchers. 

“I am here to press to you this urgency — to give to you this _seed_ of suspicion even if we cannot boast a hundred precent certainty. The international energon shortage _is_ something we should concern ourselves over because it is directly impacting us, even here and now, and in the future it will render us extinct.”

“If even that is not of interest to you, we can raise the _economic consequences_ that we have seen arising from the shortage. As I mentioned, if you look above, the price of energon is slowly increasing, and we see this translate into inflation across all goods because it is a primary commodity…”

Shockwave speaks for the better half of an hour. When he finishes, it is to thunderous applause and he bows before heading back-stage. The first thing is does is follow his promise; he dips into a room to upload the entire presentation and its accompanying data onto the hosting centre’s public data-base from the console that’s provided to him. An extensive paper detailing the findings follows it. He’d written it at least a month prior. It contains all proper citations and associated terminology that the laymech’s presentation does not. 

It’s the first time he’s pressed this agenda into public eye so firmly. Even if it’s not successful, he _himself_ will fight for it, and he has confidence in his abilities. Cybertron cannot fall due to something so preventable as its own _ignorance_.

He is the last and main speaker of the day. Already his public comm. link is filling with requests to meet later. Shockwave will go and greet them in a moment. As soon as the upload finishes. It’s a lengthy document, the raw data, the methodology of its processing, every last spreadsheet included — Shockwave aims for total transparency because he can afford it. 

He can hear members of staff occasionally hurry past the open door, talking into head-pieces. Not every mech has their own comm. link. In retrospect, when he had called Orion a few days prior, Orion had probably been using an external phone.

Not that he should be thinking about Orion. His fingers dance over the console idly. Orion will lead him into trouble if he hasn’t _already_ , but Shockwave can’t stop thinking about him. It’s going to doom Proteus’ courtship if he’s not careful. Shockwave has already demonstrated a complete inability to be careful when Orion is involved.

He hears the door shut. “Congratulations,” a voice comes says, and Shockwave turns around in his seat. It’s another speaker from earlier in the day, though Shockwave had missed his presentation preparing for his own. He’d planned to watch the recording later that evening. “It’s remarkable how many resources you have at your disposal.”

The speaker is a flight-frame. “Starscream,” he introduces himself, extending a hand. Shockwave rises to take it. 

“The senator from Vos?” Shockwave asks. Starscream’s grin widens. 

“That’s right.”

Shockwave’s optics slant to the now-closed door. “Why have you come to see me?” He has not heard favourable things about Starscream. A newly-minted senator, prone to _ripping off_ his investors and supporters. 

“Oh, simply to tell you what a terrific job you did on stage, you know–“

“Liar,” Shockwave says, blandly dry. Starscream’s wings stiffen. After Skywarp and Thundercracker, Shockwave is familiar at reading flight frame emotions. 

Moreover, Shockwave is a flight frame himself, but none of the stigma attached with the alt-mode. It’s part of what makes him so coveted.

“Are you telling me that you can’t appreciate gratitude?”

“Starscream, you want something from me. You’re lurking around backstage even after your presentation has finished. Is it to _sabotage_ my work as I upload it into the public? Unless you plan to _kill_ me, I won’t let you keep my data from reaching the right audials.” 

“Oh, it’s nothing of the sort, you paranoid glitch.” Starscream’s wings flick upwards. “I’m running from my own demons. You simply happened to be in here when I stepped in.”

Shockwave ex-vents heavily. “Your constituents.” 

“What? No.”

Again, so laughably similar to Skywarp. “You’re familiar with me, Senator Starscream. You must know that I present a heading force in the Senate. Do you think I gathered it by remaining _blind_ to political affairs?”

“It’s not _political_ ,” Starscream bristles, which means Shockwave is completely correct in his guess that Starscream is running from mechs that he owes credits. “It’s personal.”

“You have a warped sense of definitions if that’s what you believe.” Shockwave crosses his arms and scans the seeker from head to toe, and a thought sparks in his mind. He can use this. “As it so happens, I have a proposal for you.”

“Is this _blackmail_ , Senator?”

> Skywarp, how would you feel about leaving to live with another flight-frame? Please ask Thundercracker as well. You’ll have to undergo rebuilds.

“As I said— your vocabulary needs work. A _proposal_. A two-way transaction.”

“What could I _possibly_ offer that you would want?” Starscream splays out his wings and leans back, his helm raised haughtily. “Hm? Great and capable Senator Shockwave?” Shockwave is supremely unsurprised that Starscream has managed to antagonise nearly every mech he’s met. 

> yes please yes yes 

“One moment,” Shockwave says, turning away. 

> You _must_ consider this carefully, Skywarp. I believe he’ll protect you, but there is no guarantee. Have you heard of Senator Starscream?

Yet still, Skywarp replies alarmingly quickly from where he must be using one of the Academy’s consoles.

> He’ll be fine

“Have you ever considered getting a body double, Starscream?” Shockwave asks. He sees Starscream’s optics brighten. 

“You must read minds,” Starscream croons. His hands flex wide like talons. If he’s adept, he’s _lying_ and just trying to prompt Shockwave to admit what _he_ wants. 

“Good, because I have two flight-frames who can be re-formatted to fit your profile and used to deter tax-payers.”

“And in return?”

Shockwave can’t ask him for _nothing_ , nor to even protect them, because it’ll show his hand. Why would Senator Shockwave be so invested in the well-being of two flight-frame _outliers_? “Creds,” he says bluntly. “And make sure you pass my findings on in Vos. Advocate them.”

“Oh, Senator,” Starscream sighs. “I should’ve known. More for your research? One day I’ll see you do something that isn’t involved in _science_.” He flicks a hand dismissively. “I’ll think about it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's so goofy how the Transformers use phones, but they do. I love Tarn with a tiny phone tucked between his helm and his giant tank treads, calling up Shockwave to ~~have phonesex~~ kill him.
> 
> Starscream _is_ a senator in Vos running from his tax-payers. Canonically he buys them out of JAAT on his own. As mentioned in chap. 1 endnotes, they were unhappy in there.


	4. Chapter 4

A week later, the conference concludes, and Shockwave returns to the Academy. Proteus contacts him almost immediately in request for another meeting, and Shockwave’s acceptance is as reluctant as he can make it. Proteus replies that he’ll wait for Shockwave outside the Academy.

Shockwave doesn’t want his outliers to see that _filth_ come so close to their own home. He leaves the laboratory early so that if Proteus arrives ahead of time, he will not linger for more time than necessary. 

It’s a fortunate thing that he does, because as he steps out an hour before the designated meeting time, he sees Proteus heading up the broad staircase that leads to the entrance of the Academy. A swell of anger crests in him. Proteus had been planning to _spy_.

Shockwave meets him halfway, standing on the step above Proteus to look down. “Punctuality is _common courtesy_ , Senator. Unless you deem me undeserving of it?” 

“Call me by my name, Shockwave,” Proteus says. “Traffic was surprisingly clear.”

Shockwave looks up. High in the sky is a bulky, inelegant thing, rotors spinning like saw-blades as an optic tracks the movements of mechs below. A sky-spy. “I wonder what has changed that might make mechs more unwilling to be out on the streets.”

He had not been happy to return to see that the Clampdown was sliding into effect — long skinny rope-like fingers coming to _choke_.

“Please, Shockwave, it is for the good of the people.” Proteus reaches out an inviting hand. Again, Shockwave does not take it. He makes a silent vow that he will never take that hand.

“What good is it if the people hardly even want to be _outside_?”

“All change is met with resistance,” Proteus says. He grabs Shockwave — again — and pulls him down the stairs to the awaiting shuttle vehicle. The dark humour of his words, however unwitting, is not lost on him. “They will grow accustomed to it in time.”

“And how long is _time_?” He tries to tug his arm out of Proteus’ grasp, but to no avail. Proteus just tightens until he threatens to dent, and Shockwave does not want to begin their encounter with a full-blown struggle. He sits Shockwave right beside him, into the extravagantly lush seats. Shockwave has the nagging suspicion that this vehicle is someone’s alt-mode. Without instruction, its engine starts and they begin to move down the streets.

“An insignificant amount in the long run,” Proteus says, and tugs Shockwave’s arm into his lap and toys with his fingers. He runs his own over Shockwave’s. The touch is distressingly invasive despite its apparent chastity. “And the populace _should_ be afraid of going outside when there is such danger.”

“What danger?” Shockwave spits. 

“Decepticons.” If Shockwave loathes anything, it’s Proteus’ soft and solemn tone. It’s all slag and they _both_ know it. Decepticons are no dangerous threats; they’re the resistance to Proteus’ stifling hold over Cybertron and blown up to seem like rabid terrorists. “If they attacked Nominus Prime, they could attack _anybody_.”

Shockwave wants to scream in his face that he _knows_. He _knows_ Proteus is responsible for the attack on Nominus. “You–“

“Don’t fear,” Proteus butts in, his face suddenly lurching close. Shockwave blanches. His expression must twist into further aggression. “I will ensure your utmost safety.”

“I’m more than capable of remaining safe on my own terms.”

Proteus is staring right at him. Optics roving over his face.

“I don’t think so.” The captured his hand is turned over, pet. “So… _brash_. You could anger the wrong person at the wrong time and that would be sufficient grounds for you to fall into danger.”

He’s pulled in suddenly, sprawled over Proteus’ lap — he’s not necessarily physically weaker, simply caught off guard — and Proteus’ hands move all over him ravenously, running down the sides of his hips to reach whatever he can, squeeze.

Shockwave kicks out, planting his pede squarely against Proteus’ plating shoving himself as far away as possible until his back is pressed against the door of the shuttle. “Don’t _touch_ me.” Next time Shockwave will bring a knife. He’ll gut him. He’ll open Proteus up right from the middle of his torso. 

The rage is all-encompassing. The trembling could be mistaken for fear but is all rage. He thinks about brawling right here — about snapping that insolent helm back against the seats and then wrenching his neck cabling apart with his own servos.

“That’s no way to speak to your courter.” Proteus purses his lips. “All change is met with resistance. I’m only familiarising you with my affection.”

“You _disgust_ me.”

Proteus does not react to that. He continues to watch Shockwave as though he believes there is some different underlying emotion that Shockwave is merely hiding from him — hiding _affection_ for him. The shuttle stops. Shockwave’s spark leaps in fear with the thought that perhaps he’d finally crossed a line, tempted Proteus’ wrath, but Proteus says, “We’ve arrived. Follow, dear.”

It’s a popular intersection, mechs hurrying about with an air of desperation, unwillingness.

Shockwave’s fists clench. “What’s this for?”

The store in question that Proteus gestures at is a re-painting one. The cheery sign announces that it’s closed.

“Oh, only for Ratbat’s party, though I’d be flattered if you kept it for longer,” Proteus says, grabbing him and leading him out. Shockwave follows reluctantly onto the street, where mechs are unfamiliar in their meekness because they walk as though they loathe being under the sun. Some of them tip their helms subserviently as the two of them go by. “I want you to wear my colours.”

The denial that shoots through Shockwave’s head is absolute. That is Proteus staking a claim on him, so blatant and shameful that Shockwave could purge on the spot. Imagining it is a nightmare. He’d be paraded around as Proteus’ toy for the other senators. Shockwave’s paint is his _pride_. It is part of what he hopes to be his legacy.

Primus, what would other mechs think? Orion? Dai Atlas?

“No,” he says, as Proteus tries to bring him through the doors of the store, the handle turning even though the sign reads ‘closed’. 

“I reserved a time already. They’ve closed the entire store for us.” Proteus’ words are tinged with impatience. 

It is this nonchalant erasure of Shockwave’s autonomy that makes him confident. For all Proteus’ announcements that they would be equals, he turns on it immediately. 

“It’s off.” Shockwave pulls back. He cannot pursue something like this, no matter what Proteus may hold above him“I’m calling it off. This _mockery_ of a courtship is over!”

He is shoved into the store, stumbling to the unfamiliar floor as his pede nicks against the doorframe, paint scraping along his back as he twists to catch himself against a wall. Proteus is above him in seconds and his face is twisted into something terrible. “I wonder how that little frame Skywarp would look _grey_.”

“Burn in hell!” Shockwave snarls. He wishes he were Orion with his great physical strength and had the same recklessness to exercise it. Proteus rears back, and for a delirious moment Shockwave thinks Proteus will strike him. Hit him across his insufferable face and then Shockwave will have the footage and he will release it for the whole world to see. 

But Proteus doesn’t. 

Something pricks into him and he screams, but his voice doesn’t come out. It is caught somewhere up his throat. His vision swims. His thrashing dulls down. His vision becomes technicolour water. 

Someone, a moving ghost of shapes, comes in view. Is it the storekeeper?

“Poor dear,” he hears Proteus say. “He has these episodes sometimes.” Shockwave’s rage thunders through every atom of his being. If it wasn’t enough for Proteus is debilitate him, he would demean him and humiliate him too! Right as Shockwave lay there and _saw_!

“It’s no problem,” is the reply. 

_Help me_ , Shockwave tries to scream. Instead, his body is dragged somewhere, lain somewhere. Warm solvent is washed over him and gradually it is diluted with pain stripper. 

There is denial in his mind. This cannot be happening, this violation of his frame. Surely, surely. This is some fragged-up nightmare somewhere. It’s not him. It can’t be happening to him. 

Shockwave changes his paint on his own, in his own laboratory. Not like this. _This_ makes him feel as though he is lying on the floor in some empty chamber with the blood of thousands washing over him. Paint weeps in streaks. It runs and floods over him. Then air-driers kick on with huge roars. He sees a blur of the storekeeper enter, followed by someone else. Proteus. Coming to look at Shockwave when he is _ugly_. When he has no paint. 

He doesn’t remember most of the re-painting process. He is being branded. Packaged — a factory good. Stamped with the seal of approval. Ready for sale. Drowned in automation. 

What he does remember is being freed from his bindings, helm falling forwards to see blue, lurid blue hedged with red and gold and white. If he were organic, Shockwave would want to peel the skin from his bones. 

Instead, he’s too weak to stand. Proteus catches him and he struggles helplessly. Something else must be administered into him, because Shockwave can feel his strength returning, energon flooding to his lines, protocol kicking in, his processor whirring back to proper usage levels. And immediately he plants a hand against Proteus’ chest and puts distance between them.

Proteus is smiling. His optics are devouring Shockwave from head to pede. “My wickedly handsome Shockwave,” he says, offering him a hand to leave the store. Shockwave nearly punches him straight in the helm before he can control himself.

He’s caught between the irrationality of staying — of hiding this perverted paint job from public view — and leaving the foul place as soon as possible. The latter wins out. He shoulders his way past Proteus and steps out. Proteus is not the only one admiring him. He can feel the shopkeeper, some unfamiliar blocky mech, watching him as he goes. 

The shuttle is no longer there. Shockwave’s vent catches. “We’re going to go for a walk,” Proteus says from behind him. It settles the cold in his tanks. “Let the paint dry, yes?”

Proteus _knows_ what he’s doing. He’s going to flaunt Shockwave down the streets like some sort of garishly painted whore. Shockwave’s vision seems to tunnel; he can’t see clearly. He can _hear_ his optics dilating. This is only a prequel, he tells himself. At Ratbat’s, they’ll be mechs he knows, mechs who know what the paint _means_. 

He follows Proteus as though through a daze. Proteus points out the posters of himself along the buildings; mechs glance at them with distrust as they pass by because they are so _noticeable_. Sky-spies follow them from above the streets. They walk, and they walk, and all Shockwave can do is concentrate on putting one pede in front of the other.Before he thought there were too few mech around. Now there are too many. And Proteus is so _loud_. They’re all watching.

Until he can’t. He doesn’t recognise where they are. Proteus stops and turns around to raise a quizzical optic ridge when he realises Shockwave has stopped following. 

“Stop this,” Shockwave says, and his vocaliser comes out filled with static. 

“Stop what?” Proteus says. “I’m merely administering to you the recommended treatment after being painted, Shockwave.”

“ _I_ ,” he snarls, servos balling into fists, “paint _myself_. I _know_ what has to be done — don’t feed me buckets of slag and expect me to _open my throat_ to it, you _degenerate_!”

Proteus raises a hand and taps at his lips. “That’s not appropriate language, Shockwave.”

“You may disembowel yourself for all I care.” Shockwave turns away. “I’m leaving.”

“You don’t leave until I tell you you can.” Proteus’ says, pleasantly. It makes Shockwave want to throttle him, senator be damned. 

“Or you’ll what?” he sneers. “ _Drug_ me again? Force me to walk behind you? Is that what you’re going to do in front of _all these_ mechs, out in the public’s view? They see their infamous senator _bleating_ out commands while trying to _beat_ another into submission. Go smelt into rust, Proteus.”

“I don’t think you understand,” Proteus says, still with that tone, and moves forwards as if to threaten Shockwave. 

“I’m surprised you don’t have Sentinel with you here to do all the smacking around for you,” Shockwave says. An indescribable look crosses Proteus’ face — disgust. 

So they do have emotions in common. 

“I don’t need him to keep my mate in check, Shockwave. As usual, you underestimate my hand.”

For some reason _this_ is what causes Shockwave to hit the absolute tipping edge and then burst straight through it.

“I know what it is.” His entire frame shakes. “He’s wet for your spike. And you’re wet for mine. But I want you to understand — you DON’T TOUCH ME!” 

Every mech in the vicinity looks. Shockwave finds himself hard-pressed to care, only hearing the thundering in his audials. He can hardly register the shout had just come from him. 

“It’s all you’re capable of— _beating_ me around! Where are all your honeyed words now, _Senator_?! Bludgeon me again with your greasy _brutishness_ — extend your unwanted, groping, hands to violate my frame again and I will see them _ripped_ from their sockets!” 

“What on Cybertron are you talking about? I’ve never laid a hand on you or anything of the sort.” Proteus folds his arms and appears irate, pretending Shockwave has just gone mad. And his act is for the mechs around them. Proteus and his usual stupid slag-damned _lying—_

“Play the ignorant swine all you want.” Shockwave’s face twists into a snarl that must be ugly. “I’m _recording._ I’ve _been_ recording. You want to say that I’ve gone mad? I’ll give them a play-by-play of you shoving me into a store and drugging me up like I’m your _mechanimal_.”

“Well,” Proteus says, and his look morphs into full disdain, lips curling as though Shockwave is some sort of trash. The consequences and the jaggedness of Shockwave must all add up in his mind. Calculation. Is Shockwave worth keeping around for now? How can he turn this argument? Does he want to afford this escalation? “I’m sure this will stay silent.”

Then Proteus turns in a sweep and is gone. The shuttle pulls up by the curb because apparently it had been there all along, trailing close behind them. Shockwave is almost surprised — Proteus has backed down — because it does not feel like a win, too pyrrhic to be considered.

As soon as he disappears from sight, Shockwave’s helm hits the concrete hard because his knees give out. His frame is cycling through full emergency protocols, shaking violently as pre-existing commands clash and are locked in attempt to override one another. What this must seem like to any mech on the street. A _senator_ , passed out and in convulsions. Shockwave isn’t entirely sure what it is — some combination of the cocktail Proteus had injected into him earlier reacting with his own panic. 

“Excuse me?” he hears. “Are you alright? Sir?”

He’s lifted, the mech huffing as Shockwave jolts spastically. He can’t find the correct command terminals for his vocaliser. Light is plunged into dim, and he’s aware that he’s been brought into one of the stores lining the street. “Is there anyone I can contact for you, Sir?” He’s placed onto a chair by a table. 

Shockwave’s head just jerks. One of his hands taps out morse. The mech catches on immediately.

Then Shockwave crashes.

 

* * *

 

Orion.

Orion? 

Shockwave snaps into awareness and nearly slams his helm against the mech he is thinking so desperately of. “Senator,” Orion says, crouched in front of him. His expressive blue optics are dilated in concern.

Shockwave is in a small trinkets store, one where mechs go to purchase off the cuff replacement bolts or screws for repairs. The sign is flashing _closed_ and the owner — some mech he doesn’t recognise — is taking stock of the shelves in some back room. 

“Orion.” They haven’t even spoken since their incident on the train. “Sorry to trouble you like this.”

“What happened?” Orion’s hands hover, hesitant to touch him. “These are…”

“Proteus’ colours,” Shockwave says. When he looks down at himself again, it no longer sends him into full-frame panic like before, but only a low resentful discomfort. The processor conflict had been resolved while he was in crashed stasis.

“Why?”

“He insisted I need it for Ratbat’s _gathering_ in a week’s time.” He picks at a flake around his finger-joint. To his surprise, Orion gently stops the movement.

His touch is electric. Even in times like these.

“But why would you accept it?”

“I didn’t accept it. Why else would I be in frame-lock in some small street store here?” Immediately he regrets the snappishness, and tries to wave his hand as if to make the statement seem more flippant.

Orion’s gaze is scrutinising. Shockwave always feels as though he can see something _more_ in everything. “Then what did he have over you?”

Shockwave falls silent. There is nothing wrong about telling Orion. Eventually, if he does become the bearer of the Matrix and Prime, he will be privy to all secrets — and Shockwave would like to share with Orion his secrets. Shockwave would like a listening audial. “This isn’t the place for such a conversation,” he decides. He rises. Wobbles. Orion steadies him without a flicker of pause, his warm hands supporting him by the shoulders. “I must thank the storekeeper.”

“I already paid him.”

“Orion, that’s inane. _I’m_ the senator.”

“Let yourself be a mech for once.” Orion seems surprisingly stern about this. He steps back to let Shockwave stand on his own, and his hydraulics click into place and all systems restore to their usual pressure. Full frame reset has completed. 

Shockwave hails a shuttle; they remain in contemplative silence all the way to the memorial, Shockwave making conscious effort not to pick at his paint, where, as they’re making their way towards their bench, he says, “How familiar are you with outliers, Orion?”

“Mechs with non-standard abilities?”

The gleam of Ark-1’s memorial rises before them. He hears the rush of water before he sees the fountain, and some deep instinctive part of him relaxes. The haunt of Proteus, of the processor-blinding events, laps away like a bad dream. 

He’d overreacted. It was just paint. It meant nothing; it would be forgotten. Even when he does go to Ratbat’s party, it will murmur through the crowds for a while, but as energon begins to loosen tongues, as mechs grow more over-charged, it will all be forgotten.

There are things that are much, much worse. 

Shockwave won’t stir a fight by attempting to upload the footage onto the Grid. Then they’d start stabbing for the eyes, carving out more of each other the further they went, Shockwave attempting to dig out the dirtiest of Proteus’ secrets while Proteus does so in turn. But Proteus has the natural upper hand — he has more resources at his disposal, he has the belief or the greed of other senators backing him, and he has more strings into the Grid itself.

Shockwave will be overrun if he tries with only this short and slightly damaged recording. 

“Senator,” Orion prompts, and it’s then that Shockwave realises that his mind has wandered.

“I house them,” Shockwave says, and there is one of his greatest and most damning secrets, given in three easy and insignificant words. “He has already sent one away to the working colonies off-world. If I don’t follow his demands, he’ll take another. But he’s not aware of the full extent to which they’re with me, otherwise the repercussions would be _much_ worse.”

“I could protect them, if you’d want.” 

“And paint a target on your back too?” 

“I’m not afraid of their _targets_. Otherwise I would’ve never stormed the session.”

“You would’ve never stormed the session if you weren’t aware how easily they could offline mechs — two of your own officers were killed, Orion!”

Orion’s optics shutter. Then they tilt into a hint of a smile beneath the mask. “Are you _worried_ for me, Senator?”

“Of course,” he says, because there is little use hiding it.

Orion’s arm comes up behind the bench and wraps around his shoulder. Again, he demonstrates his preference for the tactile — doesn’t he know what it does to Shockwave? Shockwave leans back into it. It is a warm, steadying line. 

Shockwave should tell him to stop. Except there’s nothing explicitly sexual about it. If someone saw them, began spreading rumours, it would only go so far. It’s an innocent touch. 

The way it resonates in Shockwave’s interface is anything but innocent, however.

“I’m an officer of the law. You can’t tell me ways a mech is breaking the law and expect me to do _nothing_ about it.” 

No, Shockwave shouldn’t. He knows the righteousness of Orion — it’s why he likes him so much. “In this instance, I’d prefer for you not to. I’m getting the mech _out_ , soon, if all goes well. If Proteus tries to hunt him after that, he’ll bring the entirety of Vos down on his head.”

Vos is notoriously insular. The dislike between grounders and flight-frames runs both ways, and Starscream is one of their only senators from the city. If Proteus damages or kills the frame that is apparently Starscream, there will be utter catastrophe to pay. 

The arrangement really is everything he could’ve hoped for. 

But he needs Starscream to make up his mind and soon. As he’s talking, he sends a missive to Starscream prompting his response, inviting him over to the Academy later this evening if he has the time. He can visit the two flight-frames there. 

Orion’s optics grows serious. “I trust you, Senator. If you believe I should stay back, I will.”

Shockwave’s spark warms, though he says, “You shouldn’t. I’ve done very little for you.”

“You’ve done _enough_ ,” Orion says. “I’m hard-pressed to imagine that the modifications you made to me are in any way in the interest of the Senate — unless you planned to manipulate me after. But you would’ve chosen a different mech for that.”

“You’re not the only one I modified,” Shockwave says, because for some reason he finds it a priority to mention that Orion is not _the_ one and only Shockwave has placed all his faith in.

“That’s only good to hear. I did not fall in with you because you _singled me out_.”

Shockwave wonders if Orion wonders whether or not Shockwave is interfacing with the other mechs he’d fitted Matrix-compartments into. Is Orion even thinking about that strange, unspoken aspect of their relationship at all? 

“I fell in with you because you are doing the _right thing_ , and because you have opened my optics to the injustices of Cybertron I have been too quick to ignore.”

“I haven’t told you anything,” Shockwave says, with some surprise. “Only the truth about Nominus Prime.”

“And already that allows me to see clearly through the propaganda associated with it.” Orion’s ex-vent is steady, heated. “Nominus Prime is what they have encouraged the Clampdown _on_. What else would be a lie?”

They look together over the expanse of the memorial. Mechs scurry around the fountain, but further behind them, outside the glass the city towers, sky-spies are blots against the horizon, and enormous projectors sail by with the announcement of curfews. 

“Tell me more, Senator, about the world that I do not see.”

There is something about Orion.

Shockwave does not know what to label it. It is a deep-set notion that a mech in his presence just can’t shake, similar to maturity, that makes mechs want to confide in him. It is not charisma but a sense of understanding. No — Shockwave would say it is the underlying _promise_ of wisdom and strength. If a mech confides in Orion, even if they do not know him, there is this _sense_ that Orion will listen. He will see through any truth or lies, and if it is the truth, he will take that knowledge and cherish it. He will put it to its best possible use. 

It is no wonder he is a remarkable law officer. He is the paragon of responsible authority. It _radiates_ from him.

Shockwave does not regret installing the opening for the Matrix inside him — not that he has ever, not even for a moment.

“When the Institute was still in its infancy, I pursued it into the underground.”

“It’s _real_? I thought you’d only meant it metaphorically.” Orion’s audials flick upwards. Shockwave enjoys that they’re so expressive, especially when the lower half of his face is always hidden.

“It is,” Shockwave says, “and it is currently the worst of the regime. It exists to exert what _control_ the Senate cannot over the people. The mech I found there had already undergone empurata despite the fact that he wasn’t a criminal, merely to keep him in line because he had the _possibility_ of being able to develop great strength.”

He rests his head against Orion’s arm around him almost absently, though his mind is only too aware of the action. “But the Institute is not the end-goal. You recall when I spoke to you about the Matrix. It can grant _life_ — and therein lies the apex of control. We look down on constructed cold mechs even now, but consider if every mech is constructed cold. Their sparks can be placed in whatever frame other mechs dictate. It’s Functionism at its _core_. Your alt-form will no longer be gifted to you by Vector Sigma, but picked off the luminosity and colour of your spark, subject to the whims and born into slavery in a frame that always _itches_ with its incompatibility.”

Orion is silent, contemplative. 

Shockwave continues, “So while the Institute controls existing life — and I hear that they’re conducting _shadowplay_ there now too, where they physically re-write processors to change a mech — all that’s left for the Senate to take is the Matrix to control the _existence_ of life.”

“They _have_ Nominus Prime. Why aren’t they using it yet?”

“I don’t know,” Shockwave admits. “I’m waiting on my mech inside to contact me. When he does, you’ll be the first to know. Perhaps they don’t know how to use it. Perhaps they’re unable to.”

By all calculations, Shockwave assumes it’s a combination of both. 

“Though that brings me to another matter: Vector Sigma. It’s slowing.”

“I know. I saw your talk.”

Shockwave whole frame brightens. His optics glow, pleased. Orion takes enough interest in him to listen to his presentation on the other side of the planet at an international scientific gathering? “I’m flattered, Orion.”

“It was very informative,” Orion replies, and he’s watching Shockwave. Shockwave thinks he’s smiling behind the mask. 

“Ah- but I never mentioned it in context of the _civil unrest_ and the Senate’s plans. Those sorts of projections presented publicly would land me in very hot water.” He nearly huffs at the thought of it. “If new-sparks are formed with the Matrix, it _will_ drain out the planet’s reserves. Vector Sigma is already producing at the optimum rate for what resources are left, so anything above that threshold will break. Stopping this is not just a matter of justice, but of all life on Cybertron itself.”

“Is that why you fight them?” Orion asks. 

“Yes,” Shockwave replies automatically, and then, “but not the _only_. I sit in the front rows and witness the gears moving towards impending disaster all in the name of individual mechs’ _self-interests_. If I don’t stop them, who will? Who can? I’m a _scientist_ , Orion. I was Jhiaxian’s favourite student — despite what that might mean to you after what he did. It’s ingrained in me to value independence and transparency. Scientists _work together_ and that is how they advance, by building on the research of the old. The Senate is a _cesspit_ to a mech like me, and moreover, they condemn the mechs that I care about.”

He turns around to better look at Orion, only to startle when the bench lurches beneath him. His hands flash out to steady himself, expecting to tumble ungraciously to the floor, but the bench wobbles and does only that. Wobbles. 

He looks over the side to see that its leg is broken.

And when he’s glanced up again, Orion is laughing. Not outwardly, but his optics have crinkled into an unmistakable smile. 

Whatever severity had overlain the situation pops like a bubble. Shockwave’s shoulders draw up and he laughs, placing both hands against Orion’s arm and leaning forwards as he does. It’s ridiculous. “Forget being toppled by the Senate,” he says, “I’ve been overthrown by a _bench_.”

“Never fear. I’ll arrest it,” Orion says, and Shockwave smiles at him broadly enough that he sees Orion’s expression melt into something tender, something so spark-touchingly soft that Shockwave can’t look away. Primus, Orion is gorgeous. Shockwave could look at him forever.

Some voice in the back of his helm tells him that he must be wearing the same stupidly fond expression as Orion is.

Then an _actual_ voice in his helm rings because Starscream has sent a voice memo that he’s on his way to the Academy, be prepared, Senator.

Shockwave’s lips part in surprise and in preparation to talk. Orion’s optics hone in on the movement. Shockwave looks up, meeting Orion’s focus, and sees the intent there. Makes a split-second decision. Orion, Proteus, Starscream, too much to be so simple. “I may have to leave,” he blurts.

The spell is broken. “For what?” Orion asks, his gaze snapping back up.

“The benefactor from Vos that I’m sending two of the outliers to just notified me that he’ll arrive soon. I’ll have to go greet him and show him around.”

“I’m sure that doesn’t mean you have to leave immediately.”

“No, it doesn’t. But soon.”

Their moments are precious. Stolen. Shockwave looks at Orion again and is caught between regret and longing. In the act of saving Orion, he had forbidden himself to him. Not that Orion knows this — he doesn’t even know that Proteus is courting Shockwave. And Shockwave can’t bring himself to tell him. He wants to cling to this longer. He wants to see the affection in Orion’s eyes. 

“Tell me about art, Senator,” Orion says suddenly. “What have you experienced?”

Shockwave does not think the reference of their _dalliance_ is coincidental. “I enjoy music,” he says earnestly. “And, of course,” he gestures towards himself, “this is usually an art piece in itself, but Proteus has spoiled it.”

“I think any paint flatters you,“ Orion says, and then seems surprised he said it. His audials flatten back.

Shockwave— is _delighted_. He leans in.

“It is you, a water-spirit who skims rain from the trembling panes of my home,” he quotes, “lit by the filtered rays of the moon of your throne, gazing from a balcony of starry nights and sleeping lakes.”

Orion’s audials rise, his optics following Shockwave closely, unfamiliar with the words, but understanding that Shockwave is quoting something — some form of the art he has asked for.

“Each wave is a string of your promise, and each stream or string a footpath to your palace. Your palace is of some intangible place, a crown on a cliff, a triangle of a flame, a shape that is framed in a spark.”

Shockwave does not remember each word, even though he’d written it, but he will not be so disingenuous to search for it in his memory files and recount. He pauses it there, and then says, very simply, “Forget the frills. I’m just saying that I appreciate your blue paint too.”

Orion laughs, at that, but Shockwave doesn’t record it. He’d turned the camera off long ago, because he’ll remember every moment on his own.

 

* * *

 

Shockwave waits at the front doors and Starscream loops, arcing high and then swinging out of alt-mode with a flawless spin, his wings sliding up his back in an elegant turn of metal and plating. He touches down on the steps without so much a whisper.

“Oh my _goodness_ ,” Skywarp says from beside him. Shockwave’s helm snaps around. 

“I told you to stay inside!” 

With a _vrop_ Skywarp is gone. But Starscream is already strutting his way towards Shockwave, wings fluttering. He’s smirking widely. “Good evening, Senator. Did I just see one of the mechs you plan to gift me?”

“It’s good to see you. Come in,” Shockwave says, still smarting from the fact that Skywarp is as unruly as ever. 

He leads Starscream across the grounds, where staff and students are milling around alike, walking from lecture to lecture or simply around the social areas for study. They delve into the personnel-only halls. “Here, we undergo cutting-edge research.”

“Of course you do,” Starscream drawls. He’s been replying with borderline sarcasm to each of Shockwave’s statements. 

“There _fore_ ,” Shockwave grits, because as useful as Starscream is, he truly is obnoxious, “we have gathered a few more interesting mechs for study.”

A door slides open. Skywarp leaps to his pedes, though Thundercracker remains sitting. The rest of the lounge has been cleared out, the other outliers forewarned that they would have an outside guest, so most of the couches are empty, and the only ones there are the two flight-frames in seats opposite each other.

“See what I mean?” Skywarp says to Thundercracker as though Starscream and Shockwave aren’t there, “he’s so _pretty_!”

Starscream preens. Shockwave crosses his arms, disapproving.

“Why do you want us?” Thundercracker asks, even though all three of them already know. Shockwave had informed them through-and-through. They need to understand what they’re getting into. 

“I want a few frames to _fly with me_ ,” Starscream says. He stalks over to them, circling them, wings held high. Skywarp and Thundercrackers’ twitch in response, and Shockwave realises that he’s seeing some sort of instinctual Vos custom. “Ones that aren’t blinded by my false _reputation_. Ones that exist outside Vos. Ones,” he stops, “that are remarkable in their own right. You teleported, didn’t you?”

Skywarp shoots a startled look at Shockwave. It’s replied with an equally dirty one. Shockwave isn’t helping him out here. That was his own fault. 

“I did. I can,” Skywarp says. “I can go anywhere! Shockwave says that I have a warp drive integrated into the core parts of my processor and spark, but I need more practice.”

_So_ transparent. Skywarp is practically quivering. He can’t tear his optics off Starscream, and Shockwave knows why. Starscream is their chance for _redemption_. He’s a flight frame like them — though different from Shockwave — and a senator, no less. From being looked down upon by grounders to suddenly being appraised by one of the upper echelons in his society, Skywarp is running on a high. 

And it’s for the better, Shockwave decides. It’s a better place for them to be with Starscream than to stay here. Shockwave can try to govern the outliers as best as he can, but there’s always the rest of the Academy. Shockwave has to think about their future — if they’ll have one. Shockwave can no longer keep them safe. 

“And you?” Starscream turns his attention onto Thundercracker.

“Sonic booms,” he says, and doesn’t offer more information than that, regarding Starscream just as carefully as Starscream is regarding them. 

“I want them,” Starscream announces, looking at Shockwave.

“Thundercracker?” Shockwave asks, because they’re not his _property._

“Skywarp wants it,” is his only explanation, “so yeah. Of course.” He rises to stand next to Skywarp, who purrs and bumps their shoulders. Their wings flick into an intricate set of motions, and Starscreams’ mirror in counterpoint.

Shockwave sees an odd expression cross Starscream’s face then. It’s something that he’d label as _awed_. And that’s when Shockwave realises: Starscream _actually_ likes them in some manner. How, Shockwave has no idea, but he suspects its some subtlety in flight-frame relations that escapes him. He suspects it’s something more particular to Vos, but Shockwave has never investigated their customs.

“Do you want me to show you teleporting?” Skywarp asks, giddy. He grabs Starscream, who looks momentarily surprised at the forwardness of the touch, the fingers curling around his wrist. “Here!” 

All three of them are gone in a collapse of air.

Shockwave groans and runs his hand over his face. Trust Skywarp to manage to teleport Starscream accidentally into their _private laboratories_ or something. His _own_ is in this block. If Skywarp gives out Shockwave’s secrets just because he’s excited, Shockwave is going to be absolutely enraged. 

But another small _pop_! and someone has returned. It’s Skywarp, who plods forwards to him, still smiling broadly. “Shockwave,” he says. 

“Tell me you didn’t teleport them somewhere incriminating,” Shockwave says.

“I didn’t. I didn’t. Just sparring practice next door. I came back ‘cause I wanted to say—“ Skywarp takes his hands in a startling display of sincerity. “Thank you, thank you _thank you_.”

“Don’t thank me, Skywarp.” Exhaustion weighs on him, like hands pressing down. The memory of Orion, of Proteus, Shockwave’s fit and framelock just because of his _paint_ , for Primus’ sake, return. Skywarp shouldn’t look at him like that. “We don’t know if you’ll end up happier with him. You still have my personal frequency if it goes wrong, but there’s no guarantee I can get into Vos.” He shifts on his pedes, because Skywarp hasn’t let go. “Moreover, this was for _me_. Proteus has your safety over my head. This way I can free myself, too. This was for my own preservation.”

“I don’t think so.”

Shockwave lets out a sigh that sounds suspiciously like _Skywarp._

“Really.” He tips his head as if to see Shockwave better. “I don’t believe that for some reason. Huh. Wonder why.” He lets go, spinning around as if to look at the room for a final time. “You know, I made that promise to you, but I think I’ll make another one.”

Shockwave stiffens. He moves forwards to ask why, but before he can, Skywarp butts in.

“A new one.” Skywarp stops spinning. His wings flare out. “How about this: I’ll repay you one day, okay?” 

He sticks out a hand, as if they are business partners making a transaction. 

Wearily, Shockwave takes it. Shakes.

 

* * *

 

By the time Shockwave is leaving the Academy, Skywarp and Thundercracker have taken off into the sky in their new forms with their new benefactor. They’re out after curfew times — but somehow Shockwave doesn’t want to remain indoors and sleep in his laboratory tonight. 

The city looks like a ghost town with all the mechs missing from it. The sky-spies are invisible in the nighttime, and the neon lights from buildings seem sickly. Shockwave wonders where to go. Do the shuttles still run so late? He stands out in the cold and sighs. 

He’s so tired. Even if he hadn’t been through emotional upheaval today, he’d just had to complete two complete frame-modifications to make sure Skywarp and Thundercracker exactly resembled Starscream. His fingers ache. He’d taken great care in the procedures, because if he harmed either one of them, he would never live with it. 

As it turns out, the shuttles, automated, _do_ still run. Or perhaps it’s because only senators take them — and senators seem to be exempt from the constrictions of the Clampdown. Shockwave feels some bitterness at this when the vehicle pulls up, settling in. Through the glass, the city looks even worse. It feels like a distortion. He is looking at an image of the city. It is not real. 

Surely, it can’t be. 

He touches the window. It is falling away from him like the paint that had melted from his frame, liquid and viscous, toxic and unwilling. How can he stop the Senate? He isn’t doing enough. One look at _this_ — mechs caged inside their homes under the pretence of security, caged by _lies_ — is enough to tell him that. 

Not for the first time, he thinks about the Decepticon movement. He doesn’t condemn them. He understands them. But he doesn’t support them. Nothing rationalises bombing areas where there are innocents — and he _knows_ those ones were genuine Decepticon attacks — and hostile takeovers never do end well. 

Yet still, not for the first time, he almost feels like they are the last bastion. 

What _if_ Shockwave took a knife in his subspace? What _if_ he assassinated Proteus? It would throw the world in chaos, no doubt, but after that? How would it settle? Sentinel would fill in the void as a _worse_ manipulator, he thinks, because Sentinel is not afraid of using violence. Sentinel has been Proteus’ dirty worker, perhaps shackled back for that _lust_ he holds for Proteus. If those chains are loosed— too much of the Senate is still on Proteus’ side. 

It will just get Shockwave executed. 

What else can he do?! All he manages to do is scrounge up the scraps, collect his outliers, and now he can’t even keep _them_ safe. Soundwave is still lost off-world. He’s had to _sell_ Thundercracker and Skywarp away. What next? Will the Senate take _Skids_ from him, too? Damus? Windcharger? Trailbreaker?

The streets morph into deeper and deeper disarray as the shuttle approaches Rodion, skirting close to the edges of Dead End. Shockwave sees half-broken spires and wires towering in the darkness. He imagines having to live like that. 

Then he curls down on himself to clench his fists because _he hasn’t done enough_. 

Rodion’s police station seems to arrive quickly. In no time the shuttle has stopped, and Shockwave steps out. Its lights are on—but as the doors admit him inside, it is very quiet. The foyer and reception appear empty. There are several heavy-set doors, but only one of the corridors behind them is lit. He more or less breaks in, his finger opening up and picking the lock without so much a pause, and enters. 

He checks through every glass window he goes by. Most of them are dark inside. When he finally sees Orion, the formidable blue mech is slumped over his desk, in recharge. Shockwave wistfully takes a picture. Then he’s making quick work of the lock on that door as well, the low hum of engines and lights and computers greeting him as he enters. 

The other objects in the room aren’t of interest to him. He props his arms on both sides of Orion, leaning over from behind. Orion’s optics are shuttered peacefully where he sleeps in his seat. His audials twitch now and then with the remnants of a dream. “Hello,” Shockwave smiles, struggling not to tack on an endearment after the greeting. The audial-twitching pauses. 

Orion stirs beneath him, his shoulders bumping the inside of Shockwave’s arms. The facemask, to Shockwave’s immense surprise, retracts, and Shockwave sees Orion’s mouth for only the second time in his life. “Shockwave,” Orion says, voice static-laced with recharge, even though he’s only ever called him _Senator_. One hand gropes upwards and curls around the side of Shockwave’s helm, and he doesn’t have a moment to process before he’s being tugged down and Orion is turning his helm to meet him—

And freezes. Orion’s optics fly comically wide as he realises what he’s doing. 

Shockwave takes the leap of impulsion and closes the distance. 

And then they are kissing in Rodion’s police clinic, in the dead of the night, lips pressed together all chaste and gentle. Orion’s chair swivels around and Shockwave finds himself coaxed into Orion’s lap where broad hands run up his back just to hold him closer and they seem to radiate warmth from everywhere they touch. 

Being in Orion’s arms is better than Shockwave could’ve ever imagined. For a moment everything in the universe stills. His worries and turmoils falls like decorative stars peeling away. There is nothing but the steady rumble of Orion’s frame against his, the smell of his polish, the feel of his lips against Shockwave’s. Shockwave hadn’t even realised that his optics had fluttered closed to _feel_ all the better. 

He does pull away, though, and sees Orion online his optics also. “Am I still dreaming?” Orion asks. 

Shockwave presses their helms together, meets their optics blue to blue. “No. But that’s what a dream Shockwave would answer, isn’t it?”

“Ah,” Orion says, and on his lips curls a private little smile. He tilts his helm against the crook of Shockwave’s neck, nibbles just under his jaw, and a hand slides up his thigh. “I’ll never be sure if this is real, then. Perhaps you’ll have to convince me through other methods.”

The fingers smooth over his plating, tracing the patterned lines and sending liquid lust up his frame. Shockwave bites back a groan. “If you keep doing that, Orion-”

A particularly sharp nip is given, and Shockwave arches into it, his panel heating. 

“You’ll what?”

“I’ll come,” Shockwave blurts, and is pleased to see that Orion flushes slightly.

“I forget how dirty you are,” Orion says, his tone falling low and wickedly promising. Shockwave can’t help but squirm — his legs are spread wide across Orion’s, wide and suggestive.

It’s as though a dam has been opened in Orion. His desire for _touch_ is so strong that Shockwave can feel himself just a moment from quaking. His frame isn’t like Orion’s — it isn’t armoured so strongly. It’s built to _experience_ , to feel touch and sensation keenly. Just these sensations alone have Shockwave reeling. Or perhaps it’s just Orion Pax. With past lovers it’s never been like this. 

“Don’t,” he gasps, and Orion stops immediately. He goes in to nuzzle their noses side by side instead. 

“What’s the problem?”

Shockwave’s laugh escapes him before he can help it. The charge that’s been building in him still crackles just as fiercely, despite the darker turn of his thoughts. “I don’t know if this is wise.”

“Because it’ll put you into ridicule?”

“They’ll _kill_ you,” Shockwave says. “Perhaps me, too. Did you know Proteus is courting me?”

_That_ freezes Orion. Then, “Why?”

“You mean why did I accept? Why did he choose me?”

Orion’s hand spreads wide across Shockwave’s back. Primus, Shockwave wants it. He wants Orion more than anything. “Both.”

“It’s a sadistic power play. And I did it because it was the deal I made to stopped you from being taken away, though it wasn’t _just_ for you — my outliers. He was threatening them.”

“Senator–“

Shockwave swallows his protests by covering Orion’s mouth with his, and the kiss has more desperation now, their lips moving, breathing into each other’s intakes, the wet flash of tongues. He clings to Orion as though he is caught in a great tide and that any crash of waves will sweep him away. 

When he retreats, Orion is panting as well. Shockwave says, “Please — you remain my _brightest hope_. I have no regrets for my choice.”

“No mech should have to choose between sacrifice and another’s life.”

“Then hopefully,” he says, mouthing over Orion’s helm. Orion is so warm surrounding him. So warm and hot and still heating up further. “You will never have to make that choice.”

“Senator,” Orion says, sounding slightly choked, after Shockwave’s engines start to purr, “I hate to alarm you, but if you don’t want to interface, I need you to find a different seat.”

Seeing the flush in Orion’s cheeks, the restraint clear in his tone, and the tease of the crackle of charge between them is what pushes Shockwave into his decision. “I changed my mind,” he says, and rolls his hips forwards until their panels are pressed flush and warm. When he thinks about it more, it really is an easy decision.

Orion’s hands fly back to his hips and grind them together, lips meeting Shockwave’s again, and then they are twin points of hot connection, moving in counterpoint. Their hands fumble to each other’s seams, and Shockwave finds that if he digs his fingers into the underside of Orion’s tyres, Orion will give the loveliest groan. 

And Orion finds that if he flicks just under Shockwave’s glass windshield, at these two ports tucked underneath, Shockwave’s interface panel will snap open and he’ll squirt lubricant between them from his valve with a gasp. His spike, pressed against the heated surface of Orion’s abdomen, spills with clear transfluid. Orion tweaks the two ports again, and Shockwave arches against him and his mouth falls wide open. 

Orion _devours._ He plunges his fingers into Shockwave’s valve and at the same time delves into Shockwave’s mouth as one of his chest ports is teased yet again. Shockwave just- flies apart. It’s so much. So much stimulation at once that Shockwave starts overloading and finds that he can’t stop, his systems scrambling away from him, his valve rippling again and again as Orion’s spike pressurises against it and does everything he’d promised, riding it through the lips of Shockwave’s valve, wetness slicking between them as Shockwave’s node is rubbed along Orion’s thick and bared length. 

They pant into each breath and Shockwave finds his voice replaced instead with whines that he’s _never_ made during interface or otherwise. When Orion’s spike slides home, up and into Shockwave’s hot and welcoming valve, demandingly spreading him apart, Shockwave’s helm falls back and all that comes out is static and mews. Orion is so _good_. Every node that connects between them feels like one that’s completely new and heady, and when Shockwave tries to look down again and sees Orion staring back at him, his optics wide and his own lips parted, he knows that the sensation is shared.

It’s a slightly awkward position to move in. Shockwave places his feet on the ground and starts to rock in Orion’s lap, their thighs clanging together loudly, the spike in him sliding out in inches before plunging back in. His helm lolls at the sensation, lubricant splattering between them, so _messy_ as Orion holds him, one thumb rubbing at his chest node while the other strokes Shockwave’s swollen spike. Shockwave doesn’t even know how close he is to overload — he just feels in the clouds from sensations of pleasure.

Then he’s hauled upwards because Orion suddenly grabs him by the hips and lifts him until only the very tip of his spike is wrapped around Shockwave’s twitching valve. Orion’s hips snap up and in one smooth slide his spike sheathes all the way in, and Shockwave more or less _squeals_. It’s such a lurid high-pitched noise that he immediately buries his helm into Orion’s neck with the shame, but each time Orion’s spike plunges deep, Shockwave held there still, more small noises spill from him, little moans and _ah-ah-ah_ as he’s pushed helplessly closer and closer to a second overload. 

Shockwave is teetering on the brink of coming with a sensation bursting in his spark that he can’t name, something churning and suffocating in him. He’s not sure if the roaring sound is the energon in his audials or their combined cooling fans.

“Orion!” he _screams_ into Orion’s neck, then bites down to silence the shout because the overload hits like a _cataclysm._ His frame seizes up and the world is crushed into the points where they’re connected. The next thing he knows, Orion is gasping his designation in turn and waves of transfluid are rushing to fill his valve. 

He can feel Orion standing, still holding Shockwave to him, and Shockwave wraps his legs around his hips. They walk, and with every step, the spike in him is jostled. Shockwave groans uncontrollably at it, clenching down until he can feel Orion’s frame shaking with the urge not to thrust and do it all again. 

The lock on the door is fumbled for. They’re walking down the corridor. Then a dark room where lights flicker on and they’re in a wash rack, standing beneath a solvent spray. Orion finally withdraws, and a gush of their shared fluids follows his spike. The sudden emptiness is strange — Shockwave wriggles, bereft, but then the wall is against his back and the floor against his pedes because Orion is kissing him all over again, desperate, as solvent rains around them. 

“Primus,” Shockwave says as they draw back enough to look at each other. 

He’d fight the world everyday if he could have that again.

“I don’t believe in Primus,” Orion replies. There’s an easy intimacy to their touch. Shockwave has two hands wrapped around Orion’s hips, and Orion has one around his, the other against his back. “That was all you.”

“As flattering as that sounds, I don’t think anyone’s ever got me to _scream_ in berth before.”

“That was a scream?” Orion turns them around, so the solvent washes down Shockwave’s front and splashes against the back of Orion’s helm. “I don’t think so.” He nudges their noses together. “If I get you into an actual berth, we’ll see how loud you get.”

Shockwave’s fans rev louder. His helm bumps against Orion’s. “Stop,” he moans. “I don’t believe I _have_ any struts left in my legs to even swoon.” Belatedly, the exhaustion of the day starts to filter through. The warm rush of solvent — most police stations have showers — loosens him until he could just fall.

“I’ll accept that as a compliment.” Their shared lubricants and transfluid swirls around the drain.

They stand intertwined for a while, the mess dripping away, just holding each other while their frames cool down. When Orion shuts off the solvent spray, reality begins to creep back in. 

“Curfew,” Shockwave mutters. He’s already broke curfew once, and he doubts Orion will just to get home. “Do you have berths here?”

“Unless you want to sleep in prisoner quarters. My chair’s comfortable enough,” Orion says. 

They stand under the driers, reluctant to leave the proximity of each other’s heat even as they walk down the corridor. Shockwave intends to touch Orion as much as he can while they’re still in private because this cannot be seen, cannot be indulged, under the light of day. When they finally return to Orion’s office, Orion brings him back into his arms. 

Fitting together is easy. Shockwave slots back onto his lap and they sit, helm by helm, arms tucked between Orion’s back and the chair, and somehow Orion manages to remotely turn the lights off. Shockwave settles in. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "My... _influence_ in the Senate is on the _wane_. I spent most of my _political capital_ intervening to _save your life_."  
>  "No regrets, I hope."  
> "Please— you remain my _brightest hope_."  
>  \- mtmte issue 9. OP & SS


	5. Chapter 5

 

“Hey, big guy, I know I’m early, but—“

Shockwave raises his helm to glare over Orion’s shoulder. An enormous mech is standing in the doorway. 

“Oh,” the mech says, looking up from a data pad he’s carrying. “Sorry.”

For the most part, Shockwave is surprised because he never recharges until this late, especially not in a berth. But Orion is warm and venting gently beneath him, face-mask retracted so that his full expression of serenity can be seen. 

What other mech has ever seen such a sight? Shockwave’s spark falters — and then he remembers their interloper. He turns the chair away from the door to preserve Orion’s modesty. The glare directed at the mech in the doorway intensifies.

The mech raises both hands. “Hey, I also work here, you know. I’m not in the wrong place.”

“You’re Roller,” Shockwave says, recognising him from Orion’s descriptions.

“At your service.”

“Roller, please come back later.” Realising the rudeness, Shockwave tacks on a, “It would be appreciated.”

Roller heaves a vent, but he does close the door. Shockwave nestles back against Orion and drifts again into recharge.

 

* * *

 

Later, Shockwave finds himself down the streets outside the Academy — on pede rather than shuttle because for this particular meeting he does not want to be tracked. It’s a bright and sunny day and there are more sky-spies hovering above the city than ever. Proteus’ face stares out from every billboard, vacant optics staring out — into what? The city he is crumbling?

Although Proteus is the most visible of senators, he is not the only one. Shockwave knows Ratbat enjoys the stricter regulations, finding loopholes _he designed_ to arrest any competition to his burgeoning monopolies. Decimus is campaigning off in other cities for them all as ‘great cogs in the machine’. _Someone_ , though Shockwave suspects it is a joint effort, is starting to ‘automate’ energon mining and ordering the miners into redundancy. This is an issue in more way than one — the automated mining facilities are less efficient, the miners are falling into unrest, and the energon is being hoarded and controlled by the Senate. 

The previous energon distribution facilities responsible for maintaining a market energon price are starting to stumble. The distribution of income spreads further and further apart as the chasm between the rich and the poor expands because energon is a staple for all.

It’s ridiculously _selfish_. An economy flourishes when there is a _greater working_ population and as income distribution tends to equality: one percent of the population holds one percent of total wealth, fifth percents holds fifty percent of total wealth, and so forth — and while it’s physically impossible and forcibly maintaining it would deter the incentive to work, it should be strived for, because the alternative is-

That the fact of the matter is those with greater wealth use relatively _less_ of their total income. Every day a bot has a certain expenditure, simply for energon and other cleaning supplies, and for those in the lower and middle class, this is a larger _percentage_ of their total income.With more creds circulating in the system, more mechs are paid. More services and objects are provided and created. If creds are merely _sat_ upon and saved, hoarded and paid only among the utmost elite, half of Cybertron dwindles into _poverty_.

Shockwave forces himself to calm as he walks. Wealth and creds are a point of anger for him.

It’s a strange change, that now secretive meetings are best held in the day rather than the night. From what he knows, Sentinel is more inclined to review through footage closer to the curfew hours. In the day, there are still too many mechs to track every single one for suspicious activity. 

That is what the informants are for — snitches to the government. 

He strides past a closed energon eatery (of course, given the recent changes) and into a darkened alley that is too narrow for any sky-spy to see into unless it was hovering directly above, and Shockwave sweeps his scanners briefly out for any cameras. His contact stands waiting. Shockwave clasps the extended hand. “You’re well?”

The mech nods in reply and gets immediately to business. “Sentinel killed Nominus,” he says. “The Matrix inside was fake.”

Shockwave can’t contain his hissed in-vent. Two big strikes in one. It’s likely that Nominus himself didn’t know his Matrix was fake, so the poor idiot mech isn’t at fault, but Sentinel would’ve killed him either out of _rage_ or because he considered Nominus now expendable. 

It’s _despicable_! The paragon of their society, Nominus Prime, a farce — then thrown away like _trash_ as a bot used completely by forces beyond him. Who had placed him there as Prime in the first place? Clearly Sentinel hadn’t known, and neither the rest of the Senate, if they’d invested so much into capturing Nominus. 

He was killed. Just like that. What has their society come to?

“They’ve moved his body into the Primal Basilica and bribed the official pathologist.” 

“The middle of the city,” Shockwave says, clinging to some futile hope that Sentinel hadn’t killed Nominus but that it’d merely been a lie to let him harvest the Matrix in peace. “Why?”

His informant shrugs. “It’s high-security. I’ve been put on outer-ring watch for it. Not inner. That’s for the triple-changers. Patrols and alarms all hours of the day.”

“I understand,” Shockwave says, and the mech finally perks up when Shockwave remotely transfers creds to him — with a tip. “Good work.”

“Thank you.”

Shockwave leaves the alley without further ado. It’s dangerous to linger. He starts down the block with the new information weighing heavily on his processor. His gut instinct is to find Sentinel and beat him into _scrap_ , but it’s both impractical and improbable, so instead Shockwave is left with the question: Now what? The Matrix is out of the Senate’s hands. In all likelihood. What does that change?

Huge and obscene, Proteus’ face sails by on a poster, leering at him as he walks past another closed stall. 

With Nominus Prime gone, the vacuum of power that he’d occupied and that the Senate had been in the process of filling is finally for the Senate to take completely. It’s a _consolation prize_ for the loss of the Matrix.

The power the creation outclasses it all. What if you could create the mechs you wanted? What if you could make your own sparks? Forget controlling the people — you could _make_ your own people. You could hold above their heads the threat of wiping out the entire population by ceasing to forge any more sparks. Because, as much as every mech is different, there is one similar innate goal — for there to _be_ Cybertronians. Even the power-hungry want someone for there to have power over. Even the vengeful and the disgraced want someone to grant forgiveness. Even the hating want someone left to hate. 

He stops in his stride. A mech passing by gives him a strange look, but immediately quails when they recognise him. Shockwave ignores it — he thinks sometimes that they recognise Proteus’ paint rather than _him_ , because he never used to be picked out so easily — but still feels that familiar stir of anger. Proteus has marked him. 

Ratbat’s party is soon. Shockwave will strip off the paint immediately after. He would do it now, but the truth is that he still holds some fear of Proteus. How couldn’t he, when the whole city spins in his grasp? In Proteus and Sentinel’s grasp, though Sentinel is subservient because he’s _panting_ for Proteus. Shockwave is quite certain that they aren’t in a relationship. Surely Proteus wouldn’t risk his attempted hold over Shockwave, and he wants to keep it like a promised treat over Sentinel’s helm.

Shockwave despises thinking of the two of them. They are a match made in the absolute depths of hell. Together, they managed to string up the Senate; not that other members of the Senate did not invite them to it. Their crevices of _greed_ were perfect finger-holds for Proteus to sink his promises into. They were merely waiting for something with enough ambition and deception to be able to band behind. Sentinel, meanwhile, is Proteus’ hunting dog. He clearly has no qualms with the darker and dirtier aspects of their plans that involve kidnapping and murder. 

Shockwave considers the unaligned members of the Senate sometimes, those that work for their own ends, not for the good of Cybertron, nor for Proteus because they happen to have interests that lie outside of his domain. They are silent and either afraid of or unwilling to deter anyone’s plans. 

Then there is Dai Atlas. He’d visited not long ago to congratulate Shockwave on his presentation at the scientific conference, and then mentioned his own steps into gathering believers of the Knights of Cybertron. When Shockwave had brought up Ratbat’s party and revealed Proteus’ courtship, Dai Atlas had jolted up in alarm. Whether or not he procured his own invitation ‘ _to keep an optic on you, Shockwave_ ’ Shockwave doesn’t know, but he suspects Ratbat will be happy to take whoever. 

The shuttle arrives soon after. Shockwave steps in, presenting his serial code and ID from his palm, swirling with dark thoughts, and directs it towards Rodion station. It floats and speeds through the flow of traffic. 

On the better half of his life, the outliers seem more tight-knit after Skywarp and Thundercracker have left. It’s depressing to think that the departure of flight frames would make the outliers feel like acceptance between them is more possible. Either way, the other day, he walked into his top few students and/or staff, Windcharger, Skids and Damus — some of the only outliers that permanently live in the Academy — watching an old holovid. Or at least, two of them were. Or one. Skids had been locked onto the screen with rapt attention as the hero of the day leapt out a burning building. Damus had been asleep at his side, helm lolling onto his shoulder, and Windcharger seemed to have forgotten there was a holovid playing at all, trying to use a small scrap of metal to scoop out the energon in the cube by the sink and dribble it down Damus and Skid’s backs. 

Skids spends much more time with them now, which Shockwave is immensely grateful for. The fact that he is an outlier too, capable of learning anything at alarming speeds, is an unspoken agreement between them. He can connect with them easier than Shockwave ever could, and does not have to fend off so many responsibilities as Shockwave has to. His primary goal is to theorise about their powers and find ways to help them improve. 

But even so, even as the ‘happier half of his life’, watching them feels like watching them through a murky observatory screen. Shockwave is _there_ , he means something to them, but the honesty of it is all tangled up between obligation and payment, between responsibility and favours and compensation. He could call them his friends — but they aren’t, really. They are his students. They view him as their _idol._ Their benefactor. When something is inherently unequal like that, when their relationships are built off a favour…

So is Orion’s. 

Shockwave feels a chill pass through him. What if he had underestimated Orion’s capacity for manipulation? What if Orion had decided, when faced with Shockwave’s desire for interface, to pick the most favourable outcome? What if he knew this way he could continue to reap the rewards of Shockwave’s knowledge? Even now— Shockwave is going to Rodion to tell him of Nominus’ passing, regardless of the fact that it isn’t necessary. He just _wants_ to tell Orion and therefore he is. He wants to be with Orion. If it’s a trap, Shockwave has fallen ever-neatly into it.

But it feels so real. Shockwave touches the glass. His reflection looks sadly back at him, and the edges of Dead End flicker behind it.

He stops the shuttle. Sits there and grips his helm.

Stop going to Orion. For Primus’ sake. It’ll kill you. 

But it has to be real, doesn’t it? Orion wouldn’t have continued to pursue him just for the ‘benefits’ if he knew that the danger far outclassed it. Proteus would _kill_ him. Surely, if he were manipulative enough to be stringing Shockwave along, stringing Shockwave through like a doll on a steel thread, that huge risk would’ve caused him to back down. 

Shockwave stares despairingly outside — and sees movement in the garbage heaps of Dead End. Through the mounds and the piles there that rise like the mottled moss-grown back of a beast, there is a mech there, dirty white among the trash, kneeling, intake lolling open, a circuit-booster jammed straight into his head.

Shockwave is out of his shuttle before he even consciously makes the decision. It’s so _dangerous_ to shoot circuit-boosters at _all_ , let alone straight into the processor. It would-

The mech falls over. Another two come into view. They stand over him, talking among themselves, and Shockwave suddenly boils with fury. 

Shockwave may not be able to out-fight Proteus’ bulk, nor Sentinel, but he is more than trained to beat down two sadistic and under-fed frames. They are arguing about who would be allowed to _beat the poor mech_ , and Shockwave barrels into them like a freight train and sends one spinning straight into offline with a well-placed strike to the helm. 

He puts all his fury against Proteus, Sentinel — all his fury towards the agony of his city and this dreadful _choke_ towards certain devastation — in his next words; his optics flare almost _white_. “ _Leave_!” he snarls, and the mech does, in a frantic hurried scramble.

Not before Orion Pax drops onto his shoulders and crashes him into the muck-covered grime floor. Stasis cuffs click neatly to seal the mech’s wrists, and the mech is hauled kicking and keening as Orion jams a pole into the ground and locks the cuffs to it. The other mech that Shockwave had knocked unconscious is swung through just as easily, stasis cuffs, tossed like plastic towards the pole, and then locked to it. When Orion passes him by, he touches Shockwave’s helm briefly — and Shockwave is stunned, just watching Orion as he does his duty. Orion like this is not something he’s seen before. 

He’s covered in dirt from rampaging around Dead End, no doubt, and his optics are hard as crystals as he kneels before the convulsing over-drugged mech. He has his phone jammed between his shoulder and helm as he turns the mech around to inspect his helm. “Orion. Requesting a medical to DE911.”

Then he finally stands, casting the still-twitching mechs last looks, and strides over to Shockwave. He draws them behind a pile of scrap, away from prying optics. Shockwave is caught between a dwindling war of thoughts. He’d been suspecting that this mech didn’t feel anything for him back — but when he’d been away he’s forgotten the _intensity_ of Orion. How would Orion ever be able to lie about such a thing to him? How could he forge such intensity? It’s impossible. There is no lie in it. Orion— he is genuine and he is true. Shockwave can’t accept otherwise.

“Senator,” Orion says, extending a hand. It cups the side of Shockwave’s helm. “Are you alright? Why are you here?”

Shockwave tilts his head to drop a quick kiss against Orion’s palm. “Coincidence. Fate ties us together in its neatest bow.”

He can hear the emergency medical transport wailing in the distance, growing louder as it approaches. 

“But in reality, I came to look for you.” Shockwave ceases in his affections. His optics flick up to meet Orion’s that are as steady as steel. “Nominus Prime is dead.”

“How?” They widen. “ _Why_? Who killed him?”

“Sentinel Prime. The Matrix inside his chest was a _fake_ , and after that his fate was sealed.”

Orion pulls Shockwave to him, the other servo wrapping around his waist. Surprised, Shockwave loosely laces his arms around Orion in return. “So it’s true.” Orion’s voice rumbles through him, the vibrations rattling through his glass, his whole frame warm against his. “They will kill _anybody_.” 

Reluctantly, on both their parts, Orion draws back to an arm’s length. “You shouldn’t be here.”

“I saw a mech with a circuit-booster jutting out of his _head_. Of course I had to help him.”

Orion fully disentangles, walking back around to where he has the two mechs cuffed and the white mech is still shuddering on the floor. The medical vehicle is out on the street alongside, and he heaves the mech into his arms and makes for the vehicle that has arrived.

“What about them?” Shockwave asks, looking at the two mechs locked to the pole. One of them rattles his cuffs rabidly. Dirt is kicked up by his protesting pedes.

“I’ll return for them later.”

“The better question is,” Shockwave says, following him, “where are you taking _this_ one? I wasn’t aware there was a place you could take mechs and leakers to — unless you have one stored away in your station somewhere.”

“I convinced a medic to open a clinic here.” Orion throws open the back, placing the mech inside, and rounds to the front where Shockwave is waiting. The doors open for them. 

“Orion- if that’s true, you’re a _miracle worker_.”

“Funny coming from you, Senator,” Orion says as they settle in. “Are you sure you want to come?”

“Of course.” Shockwave hadn’t even consciously decided on it, but now that he considers it— yes, he does. The engine beneath them rumbles to life. He wants to know more of Orion’s life. He wants to know more of _other mechs’_ lives. If he never explores, if he never dares to look, he can’t be a bastion like Orion is.

Orion… inspires him. Next to him, his fingers firmly already clacking away on a preliminary report on a data pad, Shockwave feels inadequate. He is one of the greatest scientists on Cybertron — this he knows, but somehow this seems like an insignificant fact. Shockwave can conjecture and lecture, he can gather data and present and toil away in the privacy of his lab all he wants, but Orion is _out here_. He is the one actively making a difference while Shockwave has to pry in shadows and tiptoe his way through cracked floors. 

Perhaps this is what gives Orion his sense of constant _smouldering_ as though his every energon line is smoking with heat. Orion himself _knows_ what he does; he sees the results of it everyday directly correlated with his effort. Shockwave wants to see this too. 

Who are the mechs _he’s_ trying to save? The streets of Cybertron are not accurate enough observation. Shockwave’s sample size ranges from the streets near the Academy to the Senate chamber. It’s woefully inadequate. 

And how strange, he thinks, that he has all turned it back to science, in the end. He can say that this choice is for science, that it is for his scientific observation to help him better his motivation for his projects — but it doesn’t feel like such a calculated choice. There is something stirring in his spark. Something obviously labelled ‘Orion’. 

Shockwave is too far compromised. This is retrospective; this is a futile realisation. It is not a realisation insomuch as it is an idle observation of something he had decided on the first moment he set his optics on Orion. Ever since the courtroom, Shockwave has thrown everything he can into the pursuit of Orion. Orion, the mech, and Orion, as the _ideal_ he represents. Orion speaks of Shockwave as the mech who’d opened his optics, but Shockwave sees him much the same. Orion is the one who has opened his optics to _justice_ — to undying and unfettered determination. It is a determination and a loyalty that can never be bought. It is not like that of his informant, whose waxes and wanes with the amount of creds. Orion is absolute. 

He is struck, abruptly enough for his frame to stiffen, by a terrible thought. On a day where Orion has to face a sacrifice between that loyalty to justice and– personal loyalties, what would happen? What will occur when Orion is forced to sacrifice? 

Shockwave cuts throats and skirmishes in the Senate because he is _always_ forced to sacrifice. Shockwave minimises loss. He harbours. He teaches. He acts in the _clean up crew_ because he _cannot_ fight his battles head on. There is no one bot he can execute in order for the energon crisis to stop. There is no one bot, no singular problem that he can sit down and untangle to revitalise Vector Sigma. There is no enemy that he can fight for the Senate suddenly to be right again. 

Orion _can_. Orion fights every crime his way until— and even Shockwave has heard the whispers — he is captain of his squad and has cleaned up the most derelict of locations: Dead End. He’s rounded up nearly every criminal in the area and garnered respect through practically every law office in _Cybertron._

Orion is, as he had so announced on that faithful day, an _Autobot_. His wields his autonomy like a weapon, and while he cannot solve Shockwave’s problems either because, and Shockwave realises this now, Shockwave _is from a different world_. He stands in the ocean and watches Orion on the shore. He stands trying to hold back the waves but finds that it is impossible — and instead he builds a raft and attempts to save what lives he can. He is not, and cannot be like Orion. 

But he admires it nonetheless.

As long as a single bot like Orion lives, an Autobot like him, the Senate will never have complete control. Orion will fight every shackle they throw at him, and _that_ is his battle. That is his battle that he is _winning_.

In that sense, Orion is like Megatron. Shockwave has only read the bots writings, has never met him in person, but feels that same impassioned sense from him. Not nearly to the extent of Orion’s — but the two of them are examples of great mechs who put their _everything_ into their battles, no matter how small, until they become large. 

Their justice is different, however. Orion’s justice is for the _purity_ of the word and the notion alone. Megatron’s words, their justice, is underlaid with _rage_. Shockwave is familiar with rage. He can hook it out of a mech’s frame from miles away, and it is what he sees in Megatron’s writings. Megatron is not justice insomuch as _revenge_ — a revenge that just so happens to be aligned with justice — in the form of discontent and backlash of the Senate’s actions. Megatron’s justice is pinned to figureheads; it has a material goal. Execution. Death. The beheading of the Senate to let grow something new. 

_Orion_ is justice. His ideal and his fight is not attached to the Senate. It is not attached to any one bot; it is intangible, abstract, in his spark itself, and that is what makes it so powerful. 

One day, Shockwave is sure, those two senses of righteousness will diverge. 

“You’re thinking awfully deeply,” Orion says. “I hope this isn’t taking up your time.”

“I’m just thinking about you,” Shockwave replies, and the look that Orion shoots him makes him flush. 

“As insatiable as you are, Senator, we’ve arrived. I don’t think Ratchet would like a show.”

The clinic that the vehicle has stopped at stands out in the paths of Dead End. Orion steps out and has the mech in the back taken through the doors in no time. Shockwave follows, and the vehicle self-docks somewhere behind the building. 

The first thing he notes is that it is so dim. There is no reliable electricity grid in Dead End, so Shockwave is unsurprised by the light levels. 

There is no reception. The front door opens up directly into a corridor with doors on each side. Most of them are open, and an orange and white mech hurrying between them pauses when he sees their visitors. “Orion,” he says, voice curt. “Table’s prepared already.” He gestures to one of the rooms with his head. “Put him inside.”

Orion goes, his pedes clanking as he does, disturbing dust from the walls. If there is only one mech in this place, Shockwave is not surprised that not all places can be maintained to well. The medic follows Orion into one of the operating rooms, and Shockwave remains in the corridor. He’s not entirely sure he should follow into the operating room. 

“Come in,” he hears Orion call, and realises his assumption was incorrect. He goes. The open rooms he passes are lit with lamps and sullen screens, the silhouette of bots laying inside. It’s chilling. Half a clinic, half a morgue. Shockwave is sure that mech have died on these tables before because there is a distant hint of death on the air. 

A bright lamp is directed into the mech’s head. The medic there is already prying out wires and needles from the circuit-booster from the mech’s processor. Shockwave is not squeamish — he has operated on countless mechs before too. 

“I got two tag-alongs now, is that right?” the medic grunts as he works. Chips clatter onto a metal dish beside him as he removes them from the mech’s head. They’re flecked and wet with energon and other cranial fluids, and leave drips up the medic’s arms. 

“I apologise for the intrusion,” Shockwave says. 

“Whatever,” the mech replies. “Go check on room six — he’s been having fits all day. Give him one of the numbing shots if you have to.”

Again, Shockwave follows behind Orion as they head for whichever room is room six, taking care not to let any of his wings bump the narrow doorways. The numbers are painted on the open doors in hasty white. Orion gestures him into room six, and the mech on the berth there is a disaster.

In his face lie two empty pits of optics, and his mouth is twisted into what looks like a soundless scream. The plating has been fixed into its right places by Ratchet, but still there are old scars gouging across his chest where a turbine takes the place of usual chest piece or glass, and around his helm, clear scalpel incisions around major withholding seams speak of _something_ that is far beyond beat-up mechs in Dead End.

“He’s been medically _experimented on_ ,” Shockwave hisses, moving over the mech, who twitches listlessly. Sparks jump across his plating. 

“Ratchet says that too. About most of the mechs that come in here, in fact.”

“They’re empties,” Shockwave says. He rests his hands against the mech’s helm, and it quietens slightly. He can feel tremors of the mech beneath him. “ _These_ are empties,” he corrects. “Mechs that have been experimented and thrown away!”

Orion’s answering look is grim, optics lowly glowing. “The criminals we round up are those hired to kill them.”

“The throw-aways, disposed,” he says, and is suddenly reminded of Damus. “This was how I found him— the mech I mentioned. Left out after the Institute, except he didn’t have scars like these,” he traces around the helm. “He had a different head entirely.”

He looks down at the mech. The mech cannot look back. 

A pede smashes against the berth abruptly as the mech begins to scream, thrashing, seeing something, and sparks fly from between his lips. The electricity flies into Shockwave, flashing through all his systems as they rush to be grounded.

“Shh,” Shockwave murmurs. He sees his own outliers before his eyes. Damus. Shaking after bad dreams. No homes to go back to. All they have is Shockwave. “Shhh.” He smoothes his hands over the mech’s helm, steady. The turbine — it’s a generator, he realises — in the mech’s chest begins to spin. It shrieks as it does, crackling with some form of pent up charge that resists the movement.

Orion is shoving his way to the corner of the room, opening drawers to search for the sedatives. The mech begins to scream. Orion yanks out a drawer so hurriedly that its handle flies apart and he has to scrabble to try to pry it open.

“Listen,” Shockwave says the mech. “My voice. Listen. Do you hear me? Listen. Listen. I’m here.” The mech shakes and screams and twists as though he is fighting or something is taking him apart from the insides. His crackling leaps to new extremes, electricity visibly lancing through his systems. “It hurts. I know. I know.”

And he _does_ know. He realises what the problem is because it’s crazy. It’s exactly what he’s trained to look for. An _outlier_ ’s ability. 

“I can take it, here. Listen to me,” he murmurs, and his hands tighten against the mech’s helm. “Give it here. I’m _here_. Give it here.” 

Electricity crashes through him and it shorts his _own_ optics for a second, his mouth parting in a surprised crackle, and it blows out half his fuses — his fans blast into their highest gear and his plating flares out and steam erupts from him as half his coolant reserves are evaporated in the blast. 

Shockwave crumples to the floor. Strong hands catch him but already Shockwave’s systems are rebooting, his optics coming online to see that the mech on the table is silent now, and that the turbine in his chest is whirring only lowly. “Senator,” Orion says. “In the future, do _not_ be so reckless.” He clutches onto Shockwave as if to protect him from his own idiocy.

“Hah,” Shockwave says, half as a laugh because his vocaliser isn’t capable of coherency at the moment, steam still rising from him. Orion hauls him up and steadies him against his chest. 

“Ah-” the mech from the berth echoes, and his voice is like a hollow tunnel. Orion and Shockwave still in tandem, waiting for the mech to wheeze, to eke out another word. “Ahh,” he groans again, the voice breaking, and his hand gropes towards them.

A series of long clicks fill the room. The mech turns his helm towards them, and he rattles that clicking noise again. The fingers reach out for them. 

Shockwave, despite Orion’s furious misgivings he can feel as the unrelenting hold he has around Shockwave’s middle, take the mech’s hand. There is no wave of electricity this time. And instead, the mech’s helm falls back. 

Orion releases him. Shockwave lurches towards the empty. The mech. 

“He’s done,” comes Ratchet’s voice from the door. “So what on earth have you been doing to this patient?”

“How are you going to repair him?” Shockwave asks, looking down at the sightless mech.

“I can’t.” When he looks up, Ratchet has his arms crossed. “There’s something really slagged with him. Core frame incompatibility. He constantly needs an electrical outlet and completely grounding him seems to hurt him, but I don’t have anything that I can install in him to give him that. And besides,” he scoffs, “even if I had the creds, no one’s going to ship _here_.”

“I’ll take him,” Shockwave says. “I’ll take any mech here you can’t repair.”

Ratchet laughs. “Next, you’re going to tell me that somehow you can without hiring medics that’ll blab?” He looks up and down Shockwave’s frame pointedly. Shockwave’s no medic — he has no chrevron nor markings like Ratchet does. He must know that the fancy frame means he has the creds to, but Shockwave has no clue what he thinks of Proteus’ paint.

Shockwave glances at Orion. His optics are set firm. And then back to Ratchet. 

“I don’t believe we’ve been acquainted.” Shockwave lets go of the mech and steps forwards towards Ratchet. He thinks about extending for a hand-shake, but Ratchet’s are still wet with the fluids of the last mech. Instead, he bows shortly. “Senator Shockwave.”

Ratchet’s jaw falls open. Evidently he isn’t the type of mech to follow the Senate closely, to have failed to recognise Shockwave on his own. He whirls on _Orion_ angrily for some reason and seizes him by the shoulders. “You took _him_ here?” he hisses. Shockwave is vaguely insulted. 

“He wanted to come,” Orion replies. 

“You–“ Ratchet’s fury seems to build up inside him, and is released in a gritted ex-vent. “Go outside. Right now. I’ll talk to you later.”

“Roller’s been comm’ing me,” Orion says, looking back at Shockwave — meaning the message to be for him too. “I’ll return after I finish patrol.”

Shockwave intercepts him in the doorway with a, “Wait.” It’s not likely that he’ll be here for Orion’s return because he doubts he wants to be left alone for a long period with Ratchet.

He’s leaning in and Orion meets in him the middle willingly, facemask withdrawing. The now-familiar hands are pulling him closer by the hips and Shockwave has Orion’s helm in both of his hands. Their kiss in the clinic in the middle of Dead End, the trash-heap of Polyhex, is somehow one of the sweetest things he has ever experienced. His optics shutter shut and he feels their connection blooming between them, swears he can hear the steady thud of Orion’s spark. 

Pulling away makes him aware of what sounds like Ratchet’s grunt of protest. Orion bumps their noses together gently, and then turns to go, his mask sliding back into place. Shockwave watches him leave. He can never get enough even of the sight of Orion.

“So you want to take these mechs,” Ratchet says flatly.

“Yes.” Shockwave says, pulling back from replaying the sensation of Orion’s lips on his. 

“Because why?” Ratchet leans against the wall. “You want to impress Orion? Don’t you have him strung along enough already?”

“Because these mechs deserve a better life,” Shockwave says. “They won’t be the first ones I’ve repaired.”

“Right.” Ratchet truly is a menace, leaking cynicism. It should expected, Shockwave supposes, if he’s forced to operate under high tensions all the time. “Because a _senator_ with Orion — Orion who’s shown to be an enemy of the Senate already — isn’t suspicious. Because a senator _who’s already being courted by another senator_ isn’t suspicious. You’re trying to get him killed, aren’t you?” So Orion had told him.

“I saved him from _being_ killed,” Shockwave corrects, but can certainly feel impatience rising in him. “Your conjecture is deeply misled.”

“Yeah? _You_ tell me why you’re pursuing him.”

“Because he will make for a Prime that will lead Cybertron into an unprecedented era. Why else?”

Ratchet snorts inelegantly and laughs again. “You’re taking these mechs just to _impress him_ and then what, are you going to throw them back? Right back here into Dead End? These mechs have climbed through hell to even get here alive, so if you think I’m giving them over to you just to go into the scrap heap–”

“Do you trust Orion?” Shockwave snaps. “If you think I’m so desperate to bring this place down on your helm — well, it’d be too late for that already. I _know_ where this clinic is now. I _know_ what you do in it. If I wanted it destroyed, a little tip to Proteus, and magic–“ he clicks his fingers, spitefully, “-gone. I’m offering to help you. _Take it_. What does it matter to you what I intend for Orion if you know it’s not to harm him?”

“I don’t hand over my patients or my _friends’_ lives into the hands of mechs I don’t trust.”

“And clearly, neither does Orion. Yet he brought me here, so what does that tell you? 

Ratchet meets his gaze with a glare. He’s picking blind at judgements he harbours against senators. Shockwave would find it humorous if he weren’t so offended. 

“What do you want me to tell you, Ratchet?” Shockwave asks. “The fact that I fight against the Senate? That if you think you’re stepping against the laws, I’m stampeding against them? That I stepped into Dead End today on my own volition, that I hadn’t even been expecting Orion, let alone for him to take me here?” His gaze turns vicious. “Or do you just want to hear how I love him? What exactly _are_ you looking for? It seems that you’re nursing old grievances against the Senate that you’re taking out on _me_.”

“I know the first two,” Ratchet admits sullenly, “but there’s a sea’s worth of _secrets_ to you that Orion hasn’t bothered to look into. If you expect me to believe you, you’ll have to raise your expectations a lot higher than that. You think suspicion against the Senate is unfounded? Do you even _realise_ where you are? Half these mechs here are rotting because of the Senate!”

“Oh, medic.” Shockwave’s voice takes on a sardonic edge that he himself hadn’t believed he could produce. “How can you repair anyone if you point your finger at one group of mechs and denounce them all irredeemable?” 

He folds his arms. This is making him angrier than it should, and he’d wanted to _get along_ with Orion’s friends. “You’re not going to lose anything if you let me take them. You said it yourself: they’re going to die if they stay with you. So give them to me. I’ll make them send you postcards. If they don’t– well, _then_ you can come find me.” 

Ratchet struggles with himself for a moment, but then something in him seems to win over. “I’m watching you,” is what he says.

 

* * *

 

Shockwave returns to the Academy with a truck full of critically injured mechs. He has a private loading bay connected directly to his laboratory, and calls up Skids and Windcharger to help take the mechs onto operating tables, and tells them to bring extra tables. When Skids arrives, he boggles for only a moment at the bodies whereas Windcharger takes it all in stride. “What’s this?” Skids says.

“Personal project,” Shockwave grunts, taking the blind trembling mech into the lab. Windcharger smacks Skids’ helm for some reason and they share a knowing look.

They’re thanked and dismissed after the mechs are in, and Shockwave is already mostly in full swing, solvent-spray arms pulled down from the ceiling and washing off plating as he dons his mechanical eye-piece to look over and churn out diagnostic reports. ‘Helm lacerations’ is a phrase he finds himself repeating over and over. Lacerations infected. Suggested replacement of plating.

He flings the more specific orders out to Skids and the remaining outlier-operated labs. He wants two coils, designed to his formatting out of superconductors, lead alloy, niobium-titanium. If they can manage, carbon nano-tubing down its center. 

He wants helm sets, measurements in metres — and at the same time puts all the mechs into medical stasis if they aren’t already, attaching them to energon and coolant drips. Missing limbs, shorted circuits, circuits that’ve been re-lined entirely. Evidence of spark tampering. Processors critically damaged. Most of these mechs will be damaged forever. Shockwave can provides the frame for processors to rebuild in, but he doesn’t know how it’ll impact their original functions, their original personalities, or their cognitive functions. 

Some general parts he already has in his lab. He won’t use the the toughened plating and material he had used on Orion. Instead he goes for the more general carbon-iron alloy that he leaves a sample with swab tests at the foot of every berth.

His mind is churning, processing data being fed to him from every mech at once. Fuel levels, line tension, strut tension, processor commands, synapse mapping, damage reports that are still being formatted. External damage, then Shockwave opens up their chests and all their plating, leaves the scanners to observe their insides. 

Shockwave’s element is here.

And he notices quite quickly that the blind mech _can’t_ be put in medical stasis for some reason, and that he’s struggling to wriggle off the berth until Shockwave soothes him with hushing noises. 

Later, Shockwave is arm-deep in a half-dead mech’s spark chamber, trying to induce current by attaching a piece of metal with higher potential, thinking about the piece he’s chosen. Its degradation over the years will affect this mech’s life permanently. The spark is too weak to sustain its own current so it need an artificial push, but the driving battery will need to be replaced constantly. He is there in the mech when he sees a flash of orange outside the laboratory through the thick one-way glass.

In the corridor is Damus, his helm bowed and claws clutching his body. Shockwave nearly stops where he is, except he’s in the middle of a delicate procedure and _can’t_. 

While all the other outlier-friendly labs are working on the sudden influx of orders from Shockwave, someone must’ve sent Damus out. Prejudice or not, it’s true that Damus isn’t usually kept when the labs are seriously processing orders because he’d break the equipment with his talent if he touched them, and delicate measurements with claws for each hand is impossible. Shockwave tries to wrap up the mech as quickly as he can. Damus has subconsciously come here, seeking Shockwave out as ever. He needs him.

But this fear is unfounded, because Skids lives up to his name racing around the corner, still flecked with metal dust and with protective gear propped up on his helm, and Shockwave doesn’t see what he says, nor what he does exactly, but he does see Skids take Damus’ claws in his own hands, leaving huge smears of oil against them as he gestures. His body language is un-threatening and earnest. Damus, his one bleary blue optic, turns imploringly up towards him.

Shockwave isn’t entirely sure what he’s just witnessed, but as he re-focuses on his work, they leave together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been implied (on Twitter, I think) that Kaon/Amp is an outlier.


	6. Chapter 6

 

Ratbat’s mansion is prefaced with an enormous open gate and mazes of _gardens_. Not the organic sort, but living metal that has been flattened to a thinness of mere nano-metres and meticulously sculpted into designs of all kinds. Shockwave isn’t sure how it functions, but it seems to convey a sense of fastidious movement. The entire garden flourishes with curls of metal, streams of tastefully crimped strands, and so many leaves and petals that Shockwave would label their count into the millions. They twinkle and ping together as wind stirs them into singing as a thousand different chimes.

He pauses to inspect the budding head of a metallic flower, its unfurling opening promising a glowing light, but Proteus takes this as invitation to put a hand around Shockwave’s waist and urge him forwards instead. Shockwave doesn’t protest though he wants to. He can find a moment to take out of the party later, when he has extricated himself Proteus, to return.

There are other paths in the gardens, but Shockwave does not stray from the main wide one that leads to the mansion like a river, where the mansion grows from the horizon like a giant rising, the knobs of its spines expanding into gleaming turrets and lean pillars white by the floodlights like bones. 

Into the belly of the beast, Shockwave goes. 

Security lines the walls of the mansion as shadowed figures striding through the upper levels. They are silent and hired mechs, certainly not Sentinel’s men because even Ratbat wouldn’t go so far as to trust _him_ , but independent contractors that are hardly spared a glance from the guests. Though Shockwave looks up, sensing a watchful gaze, and sees— _Orion_. He stands on one of the toothed decks, a rifle in his hands, his back leaning against the elaborate curl of a balcony. His face-mask is duly in place, and body a gleam of darkness and reflected light. His pose of power — of self-assured confidence that he is exactly where he needs to be — is unmistakable. 

For only a nano-klik does Shockwave meet his optics, self-conscious of his own frame, polished into shining and paraded as Proteus’ pet. Then he is swept forwards by Proteus through the open doors. 

Orion should not be here. Shockwave recalls, only too late, mentioning Ratbat’s party after the painting disaster. Orion must’ve sought a position as a guard himself, easy enough to secure as a trusted and reputable law officer. Ratbat must not’ve recognised him — though it was unlikely that Ratbat did the hiring himself. 

Why has Orion come to witness what will inevitably be Shockwave’s humiliation? Perhaps he plans to stop it, though that in itself is a poor choice. Shockwave is determined to _put up_ with Proteus more adeptly this time. His emotions are too liable to betraying him — and the thought of that is a sore thing: the emotions Proteus so scoff becoming Shockwave’s precise downfall. 

This time he will not break under whatever Proteus does; of this, he is confident. He hopes silently that Orion will not place himself in the firing line. 

Proteus wants Shockwave as a symbol of _power_. Shockwave will show him that this is not the case — that he cannot be tamed. It is a waste of resources to, and a humiliation above all. Shockwave has managed to wriggle out from Proteus’ grasp once through pure panic, and he intends to do it again. 

The lobby opens into a grand and sweeping hall. Mechs of the upper-class mill among themselves, glittering under golden chandeliers, whereas the senators entering are differentiated by their senate chevrons. Shockwave does not usually wear his, but has opted to slot it on his right shoulder for tonight. Proteus, as always, has it flaring broadly over the centre of his helm. 

They are escorted by a few mechs adorned with jewelled _collars_ — Shockwave has to suppress his disgust — up the staircase that spreads up the wall and leads to several elevators. The senators attend a different part of the mansion than the upper-class do. Within the elite even are there _elite_. 

The elevator has doors on both sides, lushly carpeted. Music plays from its speakers and the mech escorting them calmly explains that they are their most respected guests, and that Senator Ratbat extends his warmest welcomes to them for coming. Proteus and Shockwave are not the only ones in the elevator. Senator Sherma occupies the other corner, and he eyes Shockwave’s painting with suspicion. Shockwave will have to accustom himself to this reaction as the night wears on. 

Both doors open to greet them with engraved metal and glass that wraps around the entire floor. The window is curved, providing them the view of their entire surroundings. The gardens are a distant dark twinkle, but the city glows on the horizon, and even the sky above can be seen, a reflection of swirling lights. 

While Ratbat’s indulgence is far more tasteful than Proteus’, it repulses Shockwave all the same. Not hours before, he was still trying to bring a mech from Dead End out of disrepair — he has been working on them for weeks. Now he is- _here_. It fills him with an inexplicable sort of anguish. 

But when Proteus puts a hand on Shockwave’s shoulder and steers him, he is reminded that he is not here on his own volition. 

Many other senators have already arrived, and they drink from energon flutes crusted with crystal as they lounge on assorted furniture around the circular room. Shockwave spots Dai Atlas on a stool by a bench that wraps around a quarter of the room, in apparent deep thought. Another senator he does not recognise is speaking animatedly to him about something that he doubts Dai Atlas actually cares about.

Ratbat is surrounded by more senators, but he pulls his attention to them as they approach.

“Proteus,” he smile. His optics fall onto Shockwave but doesn’t seem surprised, “—and Senator Shockwave. I never thought I’d see _you_ here. Not that that’s a bad thing— of course not. Pleased to host you.”

“My Intended has come because I wished it,” Proteus says. His hands tighten over Shockwave. Shockwave does not react, but the other senators do, their optics widening, gushing with congratulations. Proteus’s plating flares in a sign of dominance and he practically preens. 

“Yes, he put up a difficult fight for us to reach this point — deliberately outspoken whenever my policies were involved.” He nuzzles into Shockwave’s neck, and Shockwave stares forwards blankly. He doesn’t tip his helm back into Proteus’ touch. 

He is glad Orion is not up this room. There is no one in here but senators. 

“He’s _gorgeous_ in your colours.”

“Any colour suits me,” Shockwave corrects, echoing Orion’s sentiments while Proteus’ engine purrs behind him. 

“Do you plan to share him tonight?”

There are more optics alighting on him now, Shockwave realises, and tamps down the urge to shift uneasily. One of the mechs breaks away from the entourage no doubt to spread word of Shockwave’s newest relation to Proteus with others. 

“Oh, no. He’s mine alone,” Proteus says, at least aware enough not to try push Shockwave _that_ far.

Shockwave’s replying smile is mostly teeth. _Go die_ , it says, _for even considering touching me_. “Senator Ratbat,” he inquires instead, turning to the host of the hour. The act won’t be interpreted as a rudeness towards Proteus because in this domain, technically Ratbat holds the most power. “Are we permitted to come and go as we please? I’d be interested in taking a better look at your gardens.”

“Of course,” Ratbat says, clearly pleased at the thought of something appreciating the expensive, indulgent beauties of his property. “And I’ll have one of my people escort you if Proteus is otherwise preoccupied.”

Ratbat is _curious_ , Shockwave surmises. He wants to hear from Shockwave about the courtship as well. But he also doesn’t trust Shockwave wandering around his mansion alone.

He’ll get an opportunity later, he’s sure. Maybe it’ll even be Orion.

For the time being, he falls silent. Ratbat leads the group of senators to a circle of seats, fitted to the design of the room, and Proteus drags Shockwave between them. Chatter starts up — Ratbat congratulating Decimus for his recent energon mine automation.

Unwanted in the conversation, Shockwave’s processor wanders. In the centre of the room, spanning broad above the elevators is a holovid. It’s a documentary on the construction of the mansion. At the lack of interest it gets, Shockwave suspects this is not the first time it has played at one of Ratbat’s gatherings.

He sees, across the floor, Dai Atlas looking distantly uncomfortable while the unrecognised senator beside him has started to paw at his frame. It’s his own fault; he has no right to glance over to Shockwave as though requesting help. He’d insisted on coming. More pressingly, Shockwave’s in no position to leave Proteus’ side right now.

This night could almost be bearable if Proteus has learn his lesson not to agitate Shockwave, and if Shockwave is merely going to be decor at his side. The elevators in the centre pillar of the room arrive again, more senators arriving among small serving mechs carrying platters of energon flutes and coupes and elaborately fashioned snacks. They tinkle with small collars announcing their ownership under Senator Ratbat.

“–I _adore_ his writings,” Ratbat is saying, when Shockwave focuses on the conversation again. Their host gestures one of his collared serving mechs closer, and the senators reach forward for the energon. 

Shockwave does not take one, and Ratbat seems to notice this. He plucks a glass off the platter and offers it to him. Not wishing to offend, Shockwave accepts it and cradles it in his servos. He should drink it soon, though. Energon tastes better when freshly chilled.

“There’s that one about, about-“ Ratbat clicks his tongue in irritation, “- _trains_. I enjoyed that one.”

“It’s an insult to _Functionists_ , Ratbat. It’s anti-Functionist. I don’t understand how you could enjoy that piece at all,” Proteus says, while Ratbat takes a sip of his energon. He deliberately lets it linger on his lips so they’re stained the faintest pink.

Shockwave looks around at the room at large again, seeking confirmation for a suspicion. Senators are growing more tactile, more lascivious as the high-grade flows, gestures subtly larger, mechs leaning in closer as they talk. Shockwave- has stepped into what he suspects will become an _orgy_ of interface. It grants much more context to the previous request as to whether Shockwave was up for offer. 

Seated flush between both Proteus and Ratbat, Shockwave suppresses a shudder. 

“No, it’s not. Why do I feel like we’ve had this conversation before? Just because Onyx shows transport alt-modes in a good light, it–“

“–Every alt-form has a place,” Decimus says.

“Yes, exactly,” Ratbat nods. “ _He_ gets it.”

Shockwave, between them, is fighting to vent. The writer they speak of-

“Think about it,” Ratbat says, while Shockwave’s world is constricting in like the walls of a throat, “you think that talking about the train in a magnificent way is anti-Functionist because trains _shouldn’t_ be magnificent, but that’s where you’re wrong. If they’re doing their duties, then they’re fulfilling their function, and so it’s in line with the philosophy. It’s still approving of _Functionism_ if we’re saying mechs’ duties are determined by alt-mode. What you’re thinking about is determinism.”

“Yet it implies that there is something _greater_ that the transport-class represents,” Proteus says, and Shockwave can hear the barest strains of frustration in his tone.

That’s what makes him believe it isn’t some psychological ploy. Ratbat, Proteus, Decimus here — are _honestly_ debating this writer in what’s simply a morbid coincidence. Ratbat and Decimus are not adept actors. Neither is Proteus, really; Proteus leaks insincerity when he pretends.

Shockwave is the writer. Onyx is _his_ pseudonym. 

“Onyx implies the train isn’t merely a train, but a part of something greater, _above_ his menial task. Above his alt-mode.”

“Exactly,” Ratbat says dreamily, lapping at an energon treat. “ _Functionism_. The greater thing he’s a part of – is _Functionism_. Don’t you see why I love that story so dearly? And it’s one of Onyx’s only prose pieces, too. My favourite out of the poetry has to be–“

“If you’ll forgive me,” Shockwave interjects, because if he’s decided not to treat this as a threat, then he should at least _attempt_ to fix this gross misunderstanding of his own writing. “I agree with Proteus here.”

He can sense that Proteus emitting genuine surprise. Decimus is looking at him, too. To steady his nerves, Shockwave takes a sip of his energon. 

“Well, he’s your Intended. Of course you’re supposed to agree with him.” Ratbat waves off the interjection. “But anyway, poetry. That one, what’s it called? The one about the bell-class. That one was lovely.”

“It was a mockery of Axle’s _Loud are the Weak_ ,” Proteus says. 

“No, no, you misinterpret. I have it in my archives somewhere.” 

“Do you even _read_? A proper display of decent writing would be Axle’s, or Helmbringer’s.” Proteus shifts to lean closer to Ratbat, pressing Shockwave closer to him as he does. 

“Here, _it is the toll of the mech whose corpse is a bell, from the walls of the city, and the body of the hanged one that is reddened by the setting sun._ ” Following the sentence, Ratbat sighs contentedly. 

“In what way doesn’t that strike you as Anti-Functionist?”

“The bell is in his right place!” Ratbat protests. There’s some agreement from the other senators just wanting to suck up to their host. 

“It’s a _condemnation_ of the bell’s place. Interpreting the word ‘corpse’ positively is a mistake. You read too literally, Ratbat.”

How very telling of their respective personalities, Shockwave thinks. 

“You keep trying to _look_ for meaning,” Ratbat argues. “But it’s not there if you don’t want it to be. You should know how art works, Proteus.”

“I label that ignorance. The meaning is what the writer intends–”

“-it’s not like we can know _that_ , Proteus. What’s next, are we going to ask Ilyas from Iacon from seventy vorns ago what _he_ was thinking when he wrote Charge of the Unwieldy? We have to make do.”

“Senator Ratbat makes a respectable point,” Shockwave says drily, and can feel his frame starting to heat in nervousness. He tries to conceal it with another sip from his energon. “But as it so happens, I know the author. Tangentially.”

He is abruptly the focus of much attention. Shockwave takes another drink. He’d be admitting he has relations with an anti-Functionist writer just to make a stupid _point_ in what should be a pointless squabble if he said that the writings were intended to be anti-Functionist. So he can’t. But he doesn’t want to agree with Ratbat and slander his own writing by agreeing they’re Functionist. “And in that respect, Onyx wished his writings to be for _any mech_. The primary purpose was to create art with which mechs could relate. It was not intended to make any comments about Functionism at all. Any interpretation is correct.”

“You agreed with Proteus before,” Ratbat says.

“I see _The Longer Road_ as having anti-Functionist undertones, yes.”

“You make a broad claim, Shockwave,” Decimus says. He doesn’t use Shockwave’s title — forced intimacy. Shockwave tamps down on the irritation at it.

“If you know the mech–“ Ratbat says, and licks his fingers. 

Shockwave can practically _feel_ the attention from others that is drawn to the action. He wonders if it’s subconscious, though it never struck Shockwave that Ratbat would be the type to weaponise any form of sexual magnetism. 

But the prompt is clear without even needing the sentence to be finished. Shockwave leans back against the plush of the furniture, considering, and trying to ignore the sensation of Proteus pressed against him. There are no wandering hands — yet — but he oddly feels the phantom touch of growing charge and attributes it to paranoia. 

“You want to hear unpublished works, correct?” Because Ratbat is right beside him, Shockwave doesn’t look at him as he speaks, instead casting his gaze across the room. 

“It’d please me, and it’d grant authenticity to your claim.” Ratbat throws down the metaphorical gauntlet.

It’s fortunate that Shockwave has planned to take it.

“Listen,” he murmurs, “there is a water-spirit who knocks on the trembling panes of my home. In his cape of watered silk he tells of golds and riches drowned, and orders my acceptance to receive their last sounds. His song called, beseeched me to accept his spark for what it was not, to be the lover of a water-spirit and to rule with him in his legion of the seas.

“But as I replied to him that I loved a mere mech, spiteful and sullen, he bared his teeth and spat a burst of laughter, and exploded in a shower that streamed red down the length of my blue-stained windows.”

“Pretty indeed,” Ratbat says, and he is most certainly nearing over-charged now.

A stillness of contemplation grips Proteus. Shockwave taps the side of his energon flute with no little amusement. The spirit in mention is, of course, no longer Orion but Proteus — the origin of the name Proteus itself, one of its two meanings, is of a sea god, back in the bestial eras. Shockwave is not certain how obvious it is, especially to the other listeners who are less informed about their relationship.

“You think to humiliate me?” Proteus asks lowly. 

“Nothing I say will convince you,” Shockwave says. “Therefore I will make no claim for either.”

“Let him go, Proteus,” Ratbat drawls. “So prickly. Looking for things everywhere. You jump at the slightest pinch. This isn’t a place to be so _wary_.”

Perhaps Ratbat isn’t as overcharged as he seems, because Ratbat here extends another barb to Proteus: continue the pursuit and he will risk insulting Ratbat. Understandably, Proteus backs down, though Shockwave begins to feel doubtful. The sides here in this mock battlefield are clear, but _why_ are they being put into place? 

The conversation is steered away, about other writers and philosophers Shockwave doesn’t know about and are unarguably Functionist in their writings. Shockwave finds it unusually easy to stop paying attention. 

The holovid in the centre of the room is now playing a scene from a film about three lovers. Some mech must have a microphone — and Shockwave spots one cradling it while rocking in his seat — because there is a gentle crooning in the background, singing as the mech in the film abandons one one for the other. 

Dai Atlas is sitting with Momus now, who has an arm slung protectively over Sherma, and Shockwave sweeps his gaze over the room and notices _Starscream_ , moving between the crowds with ease. Shockwave must stare for long enough to be noticed, because Starscream pauses, looks over, and throws Shockwave a wink before disappearing down the elevator with one of the collared serving mechs. 

Shockwave hadn’t expected to see so many familiar faces here. He wonders where Starscream is going, and then wonders if he can excuse himself to sit by Dai Atlas instead. His place between Ratbat and Proteus is growing rapidly more uncomfortable. Heat is shimmering through his frame, and at some point — Shockwave hadn’t even noticed — Proteus has placed a servo on his leg. Is it from the high-grade? But he barely had a glass.

He can’t tune back into the conversation, he realises. Instantly fury boils through him, hot and enraged and stoked on the fires of alarm, because Proteus must’ve _drugged_ him again. How it happened without Shockwave noticing is beyond him, but Shockwave needs to leave. Now. 

“-Stocks for it-“ Ratbat’s lips are moving, and they’re still wet with energon. Shockwave’s focuses wavers in and out of the conversation, as though he’s underwater and his face is just breaking the surface, but with every lapping of the tide he is pulled under again. He clings to his fury like it is a beacon.

A voice says, warped and alien, “I can-“

He stares out from a cage in his own head, through a pinprick in a wall, trying to prevent the aperture from closing. 

“-you, Decimus-“

“Pardon me,” Shockwave’s lips move. “I require some fresh air.”

Ratbat waves him away, and Shockwave stands. His entire body is burning. He doesn’t know what this means. Proteus stands and follows. Whether or not Shockwave is stumbling as he walks is beyond him, but no mech stares at him strangely, so he thinks he still has some measure of co-ordination. The elevators seem miles away. He thinks sees Dai Atlas watching him but he isn’t sure of much in the moment.

His camera isn’t working, he realises. It’d stopped a long time ago, but there also appears to be some error in his diagnostics tools and he can’t find the _source_. He shouldn’t have mentioned that he was _recording_ to Proteus before, that one time on the street, because this time he has nothing. Proteus has devised a weapon to disable it. Should he even leave the party at all? This is placing him straight into Proteus’ clutches, and in his clutches Shockwave is, because Proteus’ hand closes around his waist and Shockwave finds a blistering heat spreading from it, his valve clenching on itself, wetness beginning to spread despite the sickly hatred that pulses through him.

Oh, no. No. Shockwave knows what this is. He knows what Proteus wants. Interface, spark-merge, and their courtship is over because they will be Conjunx Endura. But Shockwave can’t turn back. He can’t stay in this room either, for Proteus to take him so publicly. He has to try to leave. 

The elevator arrives with a noisy chime. Proteus says something that Shockwave does not hear, and Shockwave’s processor reels as the doors close behind him and all sound is swallowed. He can feel his charge building, and he holds onto one of the railings lining the elevator, trying to scrabble for his fast-fading rage. Proteus grabs his other shoulder and stabs a button for the fifteenth floor. Not the gardens, Shockwave realises, because Proteus isn’t going to want Shockwave to have the opportunity to get away. 

Seven floors down and Proteus has Shockwave pressed entirely to his front while Shockwave tries to push himself away uselessly. The drug impedes him. His panel has opened. Proteus’s hands are drifting down. The elevator doors open. A blue mech enters beside them. It is a mech Shockwave recognises, but it isn’t Orion. It’s _Soundwave_. He has one of Ratbat’s collars around his neck.

Shockwave opens his mouth to beg _help, Soundwave, Primus, if I’ve done anything for you in this lifetime, **please**_ but then Proteus’s hands snap back up and clamp over his mouth, and Soundwave might as well not even be watching them through the visor with all the emotionlessness he shows as he stands opposite them. 

“Your master authorised this,” Proteus hisses, because he must know that Shockwave is familiar with Soundwave and is suspicious of him, and shoves Shockwave out as the doors open again and they are on the fifteenth floor, unfamiliar empty hallways of luxury. He turns to see the door close behind Shockwave’s only hope and he could _scream_. Soundwave can’t leave him here like this. No, no! But Soundwave disappears like an eclipse through the clouds.

He is tossed against the wall, and that proves to be Proteus’ mistake. Shockwave grabs onto the vestiges of his rage and flings himself right back, a knife-compartment unsheathing from his wrist that he slits Proteus’ throat with. Energon flies in a mist-like arc, but Shockwave doesn’t stay to see if the damage is fatal — he shoves Proteus aside and goes stumbling down the swirling hallway. Priceless antiques on elaborate tables he shoves down behind him, crystals and metals shattering everywhere and through the glass of the windows he sees his terrified and energon-splattered face against the black back-drop of the nighttime. 

How is there no one on the floor? Where are all the servants? It was all planned, Shockwave realises. All of Proteus and Ratbat’s building conflict was a ruse — something to lower Shockwave’s guard. 

Proteus is a torrent behind him, a beast on his heels, the corridor echoing with the roar of his anger and Shockwave can’t continue down this straight path if he wants to lose sight of Proteus, but the doors could easily lead to single rooms that provide nowhere else to run. The corridor will end sooner or later and Shockwave grabs a cabinet filled with fine cutlery and hauls it down behind him, just as Proteus’s fist closes around his wrist. Plates and glasses shatter against Proteus’ frame and light reflects off every shard, and Shockwave grabs the hand holding him and punches his blade right through its main line, and then he’s tearing down the corridor again. 

There’s a bend in the corridor, and an open door-! Shockwave tumbles into it, slamming it behind him, and when he turns around his spark stops because it’s just one room. A dead end. A huge window to blackness. The room is utterly dark.

The window, to break it and jump. Doesn’t know if his alt-mode will function in this state and failing to transform will lead to a certain death, Proteus is coming, he’s coming he’s coming-

But sudden movement, and– “What the frag?” _Starscream_ says, and Shockwave is throwing himself towards the seeker in a sparkbeat.

“ _Please please please he’s going to kill me, help me, Primus–_ ” 

Starscream snarls in surprise and shoves Shockwave away, but Shockwave’s body is still on fire with whatever drug has been churned into him and whatever fear is driving him, and all he can do is stumble, clutching at himself. 

“Take me out the window,” Shockwave babbles, because he’s trapped here. He’s _trapped_ and _Proteus is coming_ \- he’ll _realise_ that no more furniture in the hallway has been destroyed past this area and coupled with the bend in the path, he’ll know Shockwave is in one of the rooms. 

Starscream hisses, “And get myself put on Ratbat’s hitlist? I’m already _stealing_ here, Shockwave!”

His cowardice is _astounding_. “I don’t _care_ — just _help_ me — _somehow_!”

Shockwave can _hear_ Proteus out in the corridor, bellowing his name, and that seems to be what tips Starscream into action as well. He shoves Shockwave back into a corner, behind a cabinet so that he won’t be seen immediately from the door, and Shockwave is shaking from head to pede, trying to tuck himself into as small of a ball as possible. 

He’s running through the frenzied feed of his own systems, trying to force his panel to close where his valve and spike are exposed to the air and throbbing, clutching at the strands of code and trying to force them into place when the door crashes open and Shockwave locks into complete fear. The rectangle of light from the corridor stretches past the cabinet. He can see Proteus’ silhouette.

“Is it _you_ making this ruckus?” Starscream asks from the other side of the room, with all the perfect intonation of a mech who is vaguely surprised but also exasperated and Shockwave is so _damningly_ grateful for him in that moment when the silhouette disappears and Shockwave hears other doors being torn off their hinges. Then Starscream is in front of him again, and whatever Starscream had seen in Proteus’ expression must’ve terrified him as well, because Starscream _knows_ he’s doomed himself as well now if Shockwave is found here. 

“You have to go. Go now, when he’s looking in one of the other rooms.”

Shockwave’s processor wars between complete denial and the knowledge that Proteus _will_ return when he doesn’t find Shockwave, and Starscream drags him to his feet and Shockwave takes the plunge out of the room and into the corridor. 

He can hear clattering from the room just beside, and Shockwave _hurries_ without running, his spark in his throat. His pede-steps are light; he tries to clamp down on his in-vents. He turns the bend again and puts as much urgency in his pace as he dares, and he can’t look back because he has to put all his focus in his path — all the ornaments he’d torn down before are now his enemy, glass shards threatening to crunch under his steps, the slickness of Proteus’ energon, clambering over the fallen cabinet, and back back through fallen vases and the enormous window and his energon is so loud in his lines, convinced any moment now he’ll hear the thunder of Proteus behind him. 

The elevators. Shockwave jabs the button for _down_ but they’re so far away on the _ground floor_ , all three of them. He wants to hide while the elevator comes up, and tries one of the doors nearby but it’s locked. He stands there glaringly out in the open and if Proteus rounds the corner, he’ll see Shockwave standing there damningly, tremors starting again from his fingertips. The spray of energon is still marked against the floor where he slit Proteus’ line.

The ruckus falls quiet. Eerily still. Proteus listening like a predator and determined to wait out his prey.

Shockwave clamps down on his vents and doesn’t dare even _move_. Doesn’t dare think. Processor nothing but _please please please please please_ hurry up hurry up why does it take so _long_ -

_Ding!_ the arriving elevator practically screams into the silence, and Shockwave knows it’s given him away. He throws himself into it, pressing for ground ground ground close doors close doors and he can hear the renewed chase, glass shrieking as Proteus turns back around and _knows_ Shockwave has somehow slipped around him to the elevators. 

The doors close and Shockwave’s legs crumple. He hits the floor of the elevator and scrambles through all his coding, physically grabbing his spike and forcing it, teeth gritted into pain, back into its sheath, and similarly seizes his valve cover and fumbles for the manual latch. The floors are counting down. 

And Proteus is still coming. Shockwave has fifteen floors of an elevator trip as a head start, and he hauls himself to his feet again as the doors open and he _tears_ onto the ground floor where all the upper-class mech are still milling in their indulgence, the chandeliers throwing brightness everywhere, mechs jubilant and dancing among themselves, clutching glasses of energon. Shockwave glances back at the numbers above the elevators and the second one is on fifteen, and starting to move down. 

He sprints down the staircase, uncaring of who sees him, and the cursed heat is still rampaging through his systems and making itself known now that he’s in the presence of so many other interface-ready mechs. He can feel himself growing wet but he doesn’t care one iota for it and he bursts out the front doors into the stillness of the gardens.

Surely there’ll still be shuttles waiting outside the front gates. The garden path feels too long. The darkness is stifling. Shockwave runs, and runs, and the main path in its dim blue lights, illuminated by small glowing plants, feels like the arrows to an emergency exit. The delicate foil of the hedges pass by, and Shockwave is _nearly there_ , and he knows in his head that Proteus would’ve reached the ground floor by now-

Rising into view like a gravestone, the gate is closed. Looming, unyielding steel bars tower in his way. The street lies just beyond, but the entire property is walled. 

Shockwave is fenced in. 

He pulls for his transformation sequence, because as difficult as it is for a spacecraft to take off in close quarters it’ll be better than _nothing_ , but his t-cog barely initialises before it spits back error feedback and now Shockwave is trapped in the gardens and Proteus is coming for him. 

Shockwave bolts blindly down one of the side-paths, over short bridges crossed running water, surely, surely Proteus won’t find him. The gardens are too large. He won’t. 

But for a whole _night?_ Shockwave realises now that the gates will be monitored — he’ll have to hide for as long as it takes the drug to wear off and either he can transform to flee and/or his camera will come back online and he will capture the crime in all its detail. 

It doesn’t feel as though it’ll be flushed from his systems soon. His interface cover has slid open again and trickles lubricant down his legs, awful and revealing. 

Proteus will call for back-up from Ratbat now that Shockwave has escaped him. The gardens will be crawling with mechs in no time, and Shockwave will be forced to the ground, forced, his spark chamber pried open, and _he will have no proof_ otherwise. It’s a crime — if any mech here knew, it’d be the most outrageous crime, but no one would take Shockwave’s word. He’s too infamous for being rash, too infamous for being emotionally driven and they’d assume he was lying and they’ve already _seen_ him as Proteus’ _Intended_.

He’s running nowhere. Running for the sake of running. It’s so silent around him, the metal leaves swallowing all noise, nothing but their gentle tinkling that Shockwave would think was beautiful but is now only horrifying. Shockwave stops in a small clearing of flowers and hedges, venting hard, forcing himself to think of some plan, any plan that will free him from this trap he’s walked into.

He hears the pede-steps too late. 

Through what little light there is from the plants around them, Shockwave sees the movement — the mech is blue. Not Soundwave. But no gold. Not Proteus. A dark slant. It’s Orion. 

“Orion,” Shockwave breathes, and collapses. Orion launches himself forwards to catch him. He tugs Shockwave close, and Shockwave clings onto him like the world is falling away because this is it. Orion is his salvation. Undoubtably. Shockwave had been hoping for him to arrive and _finally_ , he has. 

“Your friend– Dai Atlas, he came to find me–“

“ _Orion_.” Shockwave’s words are more of a plea now, and his valve is wetting itself so vigorously that it’s smearing all over Orion’s thigh. “Please. Bond with me.”

“ _Senator-_ ”

“If you don’t,” Shockwave says, and he _knows_ this is the right choice before his scrambled processor even churns through its reasoning. “This is Ratbat’s domain. He’ll pry you away from me and I’ll meet the fate they’ve prescribed for me. Bond with me or _Proteus_ will.”

Orion’s indecision doesn’t last long; he smashes their lips together in a kiss and then his spike is pressuring up into Shockwave, and it’s dirty, it’s desperate and not at all how Shockwave had wanted them to bond for the first time, but he loves it all the same, and he loses himself in the recklessness of that love as Orion clutches him like he’ll lose him and his hips drive his spike into Shockwave again and again as Shockwave’s back is pressed against the cold metal of the ground. 

Shockwave latches onto his shoulders, his legs wrapping around Orion’s hips and panting into his mouth, _slick slick_ each time Orion draws back and thrusts into Shockwave’s heat. He can’t help the moans and whimpers that fall from him, pleasure mixing with heady relief that he’s escaped, he’s _here_ , with _Orion_ , he’s _safe_. There’s no other place in the world that’s safer than this, and with that thought, his chest-plates part, the glass windshield folding away, and Orion’s chest opens in return. 

Orion’s mouth hungrily over his. The heat in him concentrated to bursting and his valve clinging to Orion’s pounding spike, his own spike rubbed between their shaking bodies. Shockwave is still shaking, he realises, in the echo of fear and in the overwhelming sensation of it all. 

He’s _alive_. Shockwave is alive. Damn it all, Shockwave is alive. 

Even if Proteus brings hell down on his helm, presses murder charges for Shockwave’s injury against him, presses charges for Shockwave’s infidelity, in that moment— Shockwave _doesn’t care_. In this moment there’s only Orion. 

Their sparks meld together and Shockwave throws back his helm to _scream_ , but Orion clamps his mouth over Shockwave’s and all that comes out is a whimper. Merging with Orion is a glory, walking straight into the light, a fierce protectiveness and faith and intelligence that rivals Shockwave’s own, an untouchable empathy, a landscape of mountains and cliffs and sun, a hope and a love for Shockwave that burns straight through him, brands him. It sears itself so deeply in Shockwave’s processor and spark that he will _never_ forget it. 

Shockwave has never spark-merged before, and he vows he’ll never again with any other mech because _Orion_ is there. Orion fills every gap in his spark, every longing, and even the loneliness Shockwave had never spoken aloud of is enveloped and filled instead with warmth, and Shockwave absolutely and utterly _loves_ him so deeply he feels like every other emotion he’s ever have pales before it. He bucks and overloads at the precise moment that Orion does, and their connection is so shining and burning that Shockwave never wants to let go. 

In all his life he has never experienced something so vivid as this. The world is unfolding around him, its geometric shapes all at once clear, lines that tangle around them to lead them to this moment suddenly followable and coherent. Shockwave has always _understood_ and _felt_ the world in both the rigidity of science and fluidity of emotion — but with Orion here, he is emboldened with the confidence and the strength to chase it and _change it_. Shockwave is the lens flexing between convex and concave, and Orion- looks into and _through_. He is source of light that rivals a star in intensity, and through Shockwave’s every molecule finds his focus.

He _is_ Orion for a moment, staring down at a mech braver than he could’ve ever imagined, a mech that provides him hope in the corruption, a mech who believes in him and sees in him something wonderful, and then he is snapped back into his own body but he can’t tell when one of them starts and the other ends. Happiness and pleasure and everything wells up in him and he’s hardly aware that his mind is spluttering _I love you I love you I love you Orion Orion_.

And Orion responds out loud, his own voice shaking with the emotion that he presses gently back in its equal torrential encompassment, “I know, Shockwave.” Shockwave bows and overloads again and their sparks seem to burst together so brightly that the clearing around them is illuminated in a brilliant wash of blue and white. His diagnostics erupt into crazed spikes, and in the aftermath he’s churning in free-fall, pulled into Orion’s lap, and Orion is cradling them together, their sparks slowly being sealed again behind their chest-plates, resonating now on a new frequency, irrevocably bound to each other on a cosmic level.

Shockwave holds onto him as though his grip alone can overcome the forces between them.

Worry begins to creep back in, the euphoria over, the realisation that Shockwave is cornered either way because he’s merged with another mech while accepting the courtship of another, but then-

**Incoming request [e976q0] for file transfer [30133042.oip]: Accept/Decline.**

It’s _Soundwave_. There in Orion’s hold, he opens the file, and it’s surveillance footage. He watches through it with a horrified air. Ratbat spiking his energon with an unnamed dropper while it is still being prepared in the kitchens — then plucking it off the server’s platter and offering it to him. Shockwave leaving the upper floor as it sets in. The recording picks up again as Soundwave enters the elevator, Proteus claiming authorisation, and ends when the doors close to start from corridor cameras. Proteus following him.

It’s enough. It’s evidence, tried and true.

Shockwave gently prises himself from Orion’s grasp, and Orion stirs unhappily, half-way into recharge from the sheer energy released in their coupling. “I have to clear something up, and you can’t come with me,” Shockwave says, and kisses him. “Take care.”

“Shockwave, don’t endanger yourself,” Orion murmurs in a way that makes Shockwave’s spark swell.

“I always do,” Shockwave says.

Then he’s picking his way back through the gardens, and the heat in him is all gone. There is Proteus’ dried energon on his frame. Glass shards in his pedes. Yet he feels more alive and furious than ever, and he picks it up with him as he goes, seizing strings of it, dredging up contempt that he fuels with the scale of his devotion to Orion — his devotion to his outliers, to every mech that he has ever helped. 

He flicks out a command to Soundwave, and Soundwave answers in the affirmative. There’s no glimpse of Proteus as he storms back towards the mansion, through the indulgence, and security is starting to pincer in — he sees them spotting him and speaking into their communicators and he knows Proteus is coming. Let him come! Shockwave won’t be touched by him now.

He takes the elevator up to the circular floor, and as he does, his fists clench and un-clench in the tipping point of restraint. When it opens, the party is still in full swing, heedless of the chaos that had occurred just below it, but Shockwave sees Ratbat look up. 

Shockwave has no eyes for him. He searches across the floor for the one thing he needs.

And the holoscreen above the elevators change. The senators are slow to catch on, but they’re looking, they’re looking alright, and Shockwave feels a surge of a vindictive spite. They’re _seeing_ Ratbat on loop, spiking an energon drink, demeaning his title of being a host, offering it to Shockwave — 

Shockwave finds it. He practically snatches the microphone out of the mech’s hands just as Ratbat leaps to his feet and screeches, “You’ve _stolen_ into my security, Shockwave! This is grounds for _suing_ , and you will take it down this _instant_ -“

When Shockwave bellows into the mic, for a moment it only shrieks feedback in a sharp stab to all their audials, but then his voice is heard through its electronic scream, “SO YOU ADMIT IT IS TRUE!”

The elevators chime. Proteus steps out, and his plating flares wide at the scene that greets him. The other senators are staring — Proteus is a mess of dripping energon, his wrist leaking freely, the sharp cut across his neck like a mark for beheading seeping down. Shockwave sees recording lights click on from the ever-opportunistic.

And Shockwave _leaps_ into the silence with his fury as the giant and hideous and unstoppable holovid continues, and all the senators are watching where Proteus tears down the corridors like a monster to seize Shockwave and bond him. “ _Proteus_! There are many meanings to the name: the god of the sea, this mech with which we are so familiar–“

The microphone shorts out, no doubt caught onto by Ratbat’s security, but Soundwave must be holding onto the holovid valiantly because it is still playing. Shockwave hurls the now-useless thing to the floor and then smashes it under his pede, pieces of it exploding everywhere while he is the image of unhinged, so furious that he can barely get his words out in lieu of _destruction_.

Senators back away from him but equally give Proteus and Ratbat a large berth, frightened, confused — and Shockwave shouts directly at them and at Proteus who is watching him with a dark and unreadable look. “But my favourite meaning is a type of _bacteria_! Small — organic — and _PATHETIC_!”

The other elevator arrives and security floods in as huge mechs with their weapons systems active. They’ll evict him from the premises, just as in the past on the Senate floor. “ _BACTERIA is what you are_!” Shockwave does not resist, and for a exhilarating moment he feels like Orion as he is hauled away. “You _snivel_ into existence and _fester_ at the bottom of our society! You are a _disease_ on our kind! Do you hear me?!” 

All his indomitable fury roaring through his words, rage incarnate — “YOU ARE A **DISEASE**!”

The elevator doors close on him.


	7. Chapter 7

 

Shockwave recharges through most of the shuttle ride returning to the Academy after he pens a firm and official rejection to Proteus’ courtship, and when he steps out, he’s surprised to see Skids sprinting down the steps towards him. “Shockwave!” he says, and Shockwave meets him partway. “It’s all over the news — you weren’t hurt, were you?”

“No. What’s all over the news?”

“What Ratbat and Proteus did,” Skids says, and now that Shockwave listens for it, he can hear a barely-contained glee. “Senators were uploading your scene onto the Grid, and it keeps getting deleted before we can get a full download, but I think the understand.”

“Let’s go inside. You’re out during curfew, and I don’t want to give them a reason to haul you away.” Shockwave says this instead of responding, because he wants to address his closest outliers at once, and he hasn’t thought of a proper explanation for them yet. 

Ratbat has been caught in a pincer — arrest Shockwave and he be forced to acknowledge the rest of Shockwave’s actions. The alternative is the clear choice: sweep it all away and out of sight. Public outrage will be tamped down on soon enough, and the only lingering evidence will be the whispers among senators themselves. 

The courtship between Shockwave and Proteus, of course, is long over — not that any mech knows Shockwave has bonded another. Shockwave assumes Soundwave wiped any relevant footage evidencing it. Just thinking about Orion sends a flush of warmth through him. The whole world brightens slightly.

The halls of the Academy are quiet now that all the staff and students have headed home. Shockwave is somewhat surprised that Skids hasn’t left. “You _are_ hurt,” Skids says, and Shockwave realises he means the mess of Shockwave’s pedes. 

“That was my fault.”

“Stamping on the microphone was worth it,” Skids snorts, “I would’ve.” They push open the door into the lounge where Damus’ helm peeks over the edge of their couch. 

“You two are here alone?” Shockwave asks. 

“He wanted the company.”

Shockwave isn’t too sure what to make of that, but he flops down beside Damus, who leans in when he props his leg up over the other, peering at the glass and the metal imbedded there. Shockwave asks for disinfectant, Damus complies, clattering over to the cupboards, and on his return, Shockwave is picking out glass shards with his fingers that have transformed into tools. Skids is watching from where he leans against the furniture.

“Will he come after you?” Damus asks, meaning either Proteus, or Ratbat. Or perhaps even Sentinel.

Shockwave believes in Damus’ good spark. He genuinely cares about Shockwave’s safety, but Shockwave isn’t so ignorant to think that this is the case for all his outliers. Some of them are invested in his future insomuch as he continues to shelter them, but he has little time to devote between all of them that he can’t change it.

“Unlikely,” Shockwave says. “It was already risky for them to try rein me in without _assassination_ , and now that it’s failed, it’ll bring the rest of the Senate down around their helms if they offline me. Or try to.”

“What about us?”

“I’ll kill them first,” Shockwave sighs, and knows it’s not exactly a reassurance. “They don’t know about you. They won’t, and if it stays that way, youwill all be fine.”

“Let’s not be so grim,” he continues. “For now, I’m alive and I’ve escaped. And I’m—“ he brings a hand to his chest almost subconsciously, “—I’m _happy_ , which may sound insane for all its truth. I’m happier than I’ve ever been studying under Jhiaxian. I’m happier than I’ve ever been even when I was still graduating, so why don’t we just take that for what it is, even if it’s only for a moment?”

Skids gives him an inscrutable look, and says, “We’re- well. We’re not exactly stressed either.”

He avoids Shockwave’s suddenly suspicious glance by blasting Empyrean Suite from his audio systems. Instantly Damus perks up and his helm-fins start to twitch in time. Shockwave sighs — something he seems to do alarmingly regularly when in the presence of the outliers. 

“Is this always how you get his attention?” Shockwave says, having to raise his voice to be heard.

“It works. What–? _You_ were the one who introduced it to him.”

“No, I wasn’t. I had been playing–“

“The sad one,” Damus says. The audio clip sings from him — the mournful but beautiful light tune — and it clashes horribly with Empyrean Suite.

“For a Dead Mech,” Shockwave corrects, “it’s not ‘sad’.” That _is_ its title, though and Skids scoffs a laugh.

“‘Let’s not be so grim’, alright.”

“It’s the _title_ ,” Shockwave protests. “And it’s hardly indicative of the music’s content. Moreover, aren’t all beautiful pieces sad? Once you hear them, you’ll never hear them for the first time again. I find there’s a sadness to that.”

“Isn’t a title supposed to tell you what the music’s about?”

“Well, someone _had_ asked the composer why he’d chosen ‘For a Dead Mech’, and he said not to be surprised — it had nothing to do with the piece. He liked the sound of those words and put them there, and that was all. Don’t you know this?”

“I’m not a music _nut_ like you two.”

“No, you’re the most talented learner I’ve ever met, so you should remember this.”

“But Senator, I don’t learn _useless_ things,” Skids says, and flicks the back of their helms with a playful air.

Damus shoots upright, his fins standing in affront at the same time Shockwave says, “Excuse _me_ -“ and they devolve into an argument that ends in seeing who can blare music the loudest from their stereo systems while shouting their vocalisers raw over the din about poor taste. 

Shockwave ends up retiring to his lab, exhausted but in a pleasant way as the clinical white lights come on. He makes his rounds over the remaining mechs from Dead End — most of them have been repaired and given the offer to work in the Academy already, checking on their vitals to see if any have dipped sharply while he’s been away. The movements come naturally. It’s routine, mechanical. But as he shuts off the lights and turns into his personal office, knowing the way even in the dark, he’s aware of something else creeping up on him.

Orion. He bonded with Orion. Orion is his _sparkmate_ , his Conjunx Endura. He gropes futilely for his desk to support him, and leans against it, the over covering his mouth to hide the smile bursting across it. 

He hadn’t lied to the two. He’s- _happy_. It’s insane, it’s incomprehensible, it’s outrageous, but most of all, it’s _true_.

And part of his processor still hasn’t accepted it. It should be _impossible_. Just yesterday it felt like he’d been excitedly sitting down beside Orion for the first time on a bench by the memorial, and now they’ve bonded. He’d felt Orion’s affection for him clear and true, and Shockwave… has not received confirmation for unbridled honesty for such a long time. He has evidence that he can’t refute that he’s _wanted_.

Orion wants him back. They’re bonded. Shockwave sinks into his chair and his spark whirls uncontrollably in his chest. 

He’s so stupidly happy he could sob, and to his utter mortification, he _does_. The first gasp catches him completely by surprise and it is a system of compromises from there. He buries his face into his palms, his frame wracked with shaking that could be mistaken for laughter and partially is.

He’s never thought he could have such a thing, or would be able to feel such a thing at all. It’s so crazy and inane and _precious_ that it fills him to the brink with emotions that spill over and pour from him in tears of coolant. Against all odds, it’s happened. Orion. And Shockwave- he loves him with everything he has. He wants to clutch onto the thought of it forever. But he doesn’t need to, because Orion wouldn’t possibly let him go. 

In the flood tide of happiness the relief is immense. Orion loves him true and true. Proteus will never reach him. Orion will always be by his side. Shockwave feels weightless at daring to think these thoughts and _believe_ them.

The world has given him something so right and perfect in the shape of Orion and all Shockwave can do is sob. It’s impossible. It’s so impossible. But it’s happened. He’s never imagined it even in his wildest dreams.

 

* * *

 

By morning Shockwave has composed himself. He has Amp, the blind mech, in for a routine checkup, and he is ever-silent though the entire ordeal, rising stiffly and leaving once Shockwave is done. Shockwave suspects he’s an outlier — perhaps _artificially_ made — but he doesn’t want to subject him to any outright tests yet. For now, Amp is simply ‘hired’ as an intern in the laboratories, but his blindness prevents him from helping like the other mechs do. 

Shockwave claims that, but it’s not precisely true. He navigates the hallways as though he can see them, using what Shockwave suspects is echolocation, and most days he sits in on lectures unobtrusively though he must be unable to read the projector slides.

Shockwave is startled out of any thoughts by a knock on the laboratory door. He glances out the one-way glass, and it’s _Orion_. He nearly trips in his haste to get there and greet him, removing his equipment as he goes. When the door opens and Orion’s smiling face — battle-mask withdrawing — greets him, Shockwave ushers him in enthusiastically.

“Aren’t you on duty?” 

“I asked for a day’s leave. The offices let me off immediately.” His broad hands cup Shockwave’s arms, draw him in. Shockwave is enraptured by his optics. “I have nearly a _month’s_ worth of leave built up over my years. They’ll let me have a day. I was hoping to see you re-painted.”

It’s testimony to the turn of events that Shockwave has forgotten. He’d prepared the equipment and ordered the paint before leaving for Ratbat’s party, but on his return, overwhelmed, it’d completely slipped his processor. “I forgot,” he says, surprised, but the surprise fades into a million-watt beam. “I should’ve know you would remind me. Have I shown you my next colour scheme?” 

He guides Orion through the main room, “I’d still be open to any suggestions you have, of course. Usually I choose my designs on my own, but this time—“ he gestures to the AI and several trays in the walls extend, and a projector flickers on, “—I think you deserve to have a say.”

The schematic is projected onto the opposite wall, a rig of Shockwave’s plating with its each assorted colour. The design is awash with blue, daubed with red and white, and as Shockwave gathers the paint cans, he compares the colour scheme with Orion, who he’d built it off from memory alone and the one picture he’d taken.

Shockwave steps back until his hip bumps the operating table. Orion is staring at the projection, stunned. Without the face-mask, his mouth is unusually expressive, parted slightly, optics not their usual fierce set but softened. “Shockwave,” he says, and looks over with a turbulent sort of joy. “This from _me_.”

“Of course,” Shockwave says. “And I designed this before we bonded, so there’s no need to look so surprised.” Though it’s unprecedented for Shockwave to take someone else’s colours — willingly — even if they are friends. He’s never painted himself in imitation of Dai Atlas, or his outliers, because no mech has meant as much to him until now. 

For Shockwave, changing his paint is as familiar as all his other movements in the lab. The cans sit easily in his hands, equipped with nanite paint-strippers that will eat away the underlying colours when it’s applied. He offers them to Orion. “Paint me?”

Orion takes them reverently, turning them over. The cans are marked with the bare minimum, only a hex code for their colours. It strikes Shockwave that Orion might not recognise them. “The one you’re holding is blue,” he says, and wags another in his palm. “This one is red.” He pulls out a tray from under the berth and dials through the compartments. “Here are nozzle heads, but you don’t need to worry about them yet. We’ll do the detailing last. Here,” he says, and takes Orion’s hand, because Orion is still looking somewhat blankly at the can in his hold. 

Under Shockwave’s guidance, Orion steps forwards, between Shockwave’s legs, and on the press of the nozzle, the paint sprays onto him. Shockwave hums as it does. Despite any reservations, Orion’s hand warm and steady under his. 

“You don’t have to worry too much about following the schematic,” he says, and Orion gives a soft noise of agreement. “Just put whatever you want wherever you want on me.” His smile is salacious. He’s only half-jesting.

Orion laughs at him, and it occurs to Shockwave that he hasn’t precisely seen Orion laugh before, not without the facemask, and it’s such a lovely sight that he stops to stare. Orion meets his gaze and smiles only more broadly. One of his audials flicks in question. 

So Shockwave tells him. “I thought you were the warrior sort of beautiful — clearly I was wrong. That mask hides a _weapon_.”

“You flatter me,” Orion says, resting his helm on Shockwave’s shoulders as he watches their intertwined hands lower the paint across his abdomen. “It’s certainly never worked against any enemy of mine.”

“I can attest that it’s worked on _me_.”

“We’re no enemies, Shockwave.”

“We hail from different worlds,” Shockwave says, and Orion lifts his helm to glance at him, to gauge his seriousness, before turning his attention back to his task. “You’re a law officer and I a senator, and you fight against the Senate. We stand on opposite ends of _some_ form of chasm.”

Orion only laces his other hand through Shockwave’s, and Shockwave fights the giddy joy the simple action brings. “You’re here,” Orion says, squeezing. “You’re here where I can hold your servo and I can change your paint and I can hear your voice. This is what is real.”

Shockwave’s spark practically melts. “Well, I don’t think I can argue with that.”

“Then don’t,” Orion says, and places the spray aside. Shockwave’s arms are a solid blue, as is his waist. “Listen to your mate. He’s always correct.”

“Even when he falls into recharge at his desk? Is he right then?”

“Clearly,” Orion says, “because if I hadn’t, would you have kissed me?”

Shockwave finds it ridiculous that he’s _right_. “You’re very kissable.” 

“Of course,” Orion replies, and tips his helm up to Shockwave expectantly. Shockwave leans forwards and fulfils, and his engines thrum with warmth — the sheer warmth of being wanted, as though even though their lips press together only for a brief moment, Orion has wrapped him into an embrace.

Then he returns to his painting, and Shockwave sits pliantly under his touch. Orion has no experience where nor how to paint, but the way he cradles Shockwave is enough to make it worth it — Shockwave will remember this paint as being done with utmost care. Orion is gentle as he guides Shockwave around, coaxing him to turn slightly, to lift his arm, and they fall into an easy lull of conversation as Orion familiarises himself with every seam of Shockwave’s body. 

Shockwave wants to be remembered for his brains _and_ his beauty. His paint is no pastime. It is a form of expression. It is a desire to be desired, as superficial as it may sound. It is _emotive_ , and Shockwave is exceedingly so. He wants to be beauty in motion; he wants to be remembered as something that never ceases changing, escaping all attempts to be grasped unless he wishes it, and in that case to be able to alight in a mech’s palm with all the gossamer touch of a wing of iridescent crystal — powerful in its fragility. 

He does not want to be manipulated. He does not want to be bought. He does not want strings. He wants _honesty_ , something straight-forward and true in its desires and direction, yet he does not want an honesty that is destructive, nor an honesty without the strength to back it. 

Honesty can be a weapon. It can be a banner. 

And this, he thinks, he finds in Orion. 

A touch brings him back to reality, and Orion is there, cupping his elbow that he has just finished painting. All of Shockwave’s base colours are down, now, and Orion has made only minor modifications to the schematic rotating on the opposite wall. Even the bare colours look nice, though Shockwave is admittedly biased. He will make this his greatest paint change yet. “I love it,” he says to Orion, who raises a skeptical optic ridge.

“I think I’ve seen clawed mechs do a better job.”

With a whirl of his fingers, the compartments dispense the nozzle-heads he needs, as well as the setter, darker and lighter tones. “No, no. But it’s time to watch the master at work.”

Orion is a good watcher. 

Shockwave refines lines — though he asks Orion to help him with the seams he’s always found difficult to reach (he usually programs the helper-arms folded in the ceiling to do them) and in those moments they are frame-to-frame, and somehow Shockwave thinks that the impression of Orion will be somehow more visible than in colour with the final result — blends tones with an expert hand, accents sharpness, smoothes curves, and highlights tips so that they are always reflecting unseen light. All the while he keeps an optic on Orion, watching the way Orion watches him, seeing through it all. 

“It’s my magic trick,” Shockwave says finally, placing aside a can that is the final layer of gloss and sealant.

Somehow he feels lighter, even though he knows it physically isn’t true, like a grime has been cleaned from him. “The truth is that usually nothing changes.” He taps his lips coyly; he divulges a secret. “No manner of stature, no aspect of attitude, only what others see. _This_ time…” 

He spreads his arms in invitation for a hug, and tips his tone into the playful, “…we match.”

Orion is there in seconds. Shockwave makes a surprised noise as he is lifted entirely from the berth, his legs hooking around Orion’s thighs as he is lifted from the waist and an eager helm nuzzles into his neck. “I’ve never created any art before,” Orion says. “Not like- this. Not something physical.”

“Then this will be your best!” Shockwave beams. Orion pulls back, looks at him, and then wraps him in a kiss that makes Shockwave all loose and feeling as though he is reeling even though he’s in arms that he knows will not fail him. 

Every one of Orion’s kisses is a delight in its own, pulling some thread of Shockwave’s spark and unravelling, weaving into a tapestry of a history that he hopes to make here, together, with Orion at his side. 

He is set down, and Shockwave takes a moment to gather his senses before he can pick up coherent speech again. “I’ll show you around my laboratory — come.” He wants Orion to see everything. Of his two traits, of brains and beauty, he has shown Orion only one — though he pauses when he glances over at the bench by the window, a data pad still buzzing from where his report on Amp isn’t finished. “Ah, I think… one klik.”

He’ll just finish the end of the report, add that last additional note about Amp’s seemingly flawless navigation, sign it, and send it off to Skids. Soft plodding behind him tells him that Orion is approaching, propping his helm over Shockwave’s shoulder to peer at his work. 

_d-12 dilated 34μm, o-23 contracted 12μm, img attached. sgtion: observe._

And roaming hands start up his sides. Shockwave squirms slightly and feels Orion smile into his shoulder.

_A/N: nav. appears fully functional on exiting lab; req. sgtion:_

His fingers shake. Orion’s servos skim higher, brushing over the plating that he painted and Shockwave corrected and fine-tuned — palming over what is _his_. 

_sch. into 103 during_

Shockwave realises he’s written _during_ twice and tries and fails to maintain composure. Orion’s hands splay over his front, running a thumb over his chest plating, and then they flick the two sensitive nubs of ports there tucked away from sight under the glass. 

Shockwave arches into it with a cry and his data pad clatters to the desk. “Orion, I- ah-“ 

A thick thigh is shoved between his. Shockwave grinds down on it shamelessly, clutching the edges of the bench. “Soundproof, isn’t it?” Orion says over his shoulder, meaning the laboratory. He must know that the glass is one-way, too. 

“Yes,” Shockwave gasps, when Orion grabs his hip and draws him along his thigh, friction building heat against his panel. 

“Good.” Orion’s engines give a pleased purr. His fingers toy over Shockwave’s sensitive ports again, only skimming around the edges. “Now finish that report.”

Shockwave obeys, his white-painted hands fumbling for the keys to delete the duplicate word. 

What had he been writing? He stares at the sentence blankly, his own shorthand suddenly unfamiliar. Orion’s rubbing and fingering all over him sends his concentration sliding like water through his hands. Amp, that was right. The requested suggestion was to- to schedule him into-

Orion nips at his neck cabling, and Shockwave’s helm tips to the side with a groan to give him easier access. His panel snaps open where lubricant shines around the folds of his valve, throbbing and willingly open.

But he has to finish the report! 

_aud. tests; obsv._

What’s his last word? What’s the word, for, for-

Orion thrusts his fingers into Shockwave’s valve and the ensuing _slich_ is so lewd that Shockwave keens out loud, his face flushing. His hand slips and the data pad slides out of his grasp. “I can’t,” he moans. He can’t write the report when Orion is touching him like this. It’s too much.

“Easy,” Orion soothes, pumping his fingers into Shockwave’s wetness. “It’s fine. Take it easy, Senator.”

Hearing Orion call him _Senator_ — the reminder of who he is supposed to be, one of the most upstanding citizens on their society, wealthy and luxurious — sends Shockwave’s processor into disarray. He bucks into every slide of Orion’s fingers, his head tipping back, mouthing at the side of Orion’s helm. 

And when Orion finally growls, “ _Come_ ,” Shockwave does, a weak spurt and cry that Orion buries with his mouth, kissing Shockwave until the high peaks and fades and the shudders in his frame taper out. Orion withdraws his fingers slowly. 

He releases their kiss and sucks on the white digits covered in lubricant, and Shockwave’s valve gives another hopeless clench.

“Orion. My laboratory regulations,” Shockwave groans. His hands are practically white-knuckled against the edge of the worktop. He releases them and stares down at the data pad. It’s last word tapers into gibberish, and he rewrites it into

_interference._

And finally sends it when Orion is humming contentedly behind him. “What laboratory regulations?”

“Oh, you know, the–“

His words drop off into surprise when Orion bends down briefly, curls an arm around Shockwave’s knees, another around his waist, and just _hoists him up_. Shockwave is no a small mech. He’s around the same height — if not taller for his back-struts — than Orion, and he’s not precisely _dainty_ either, although he is streamlined for sleek elegance that he capitalises on for his looks. As a flight-frame, he’s light, but regardless-

He should know better than to underestimate his Conjunx, especially when he’s manhandled so that his legs are spread and hooked over one blue arm, his back pressed to Orion’s chest where Orion is kissing his neck again as his spike pressurises between the lips of Shockwave’s still-bared valve. 

“Good?” Orion asks. 

“ _Unfathomably_ ,” Shockwave gasps, and the other hand gripping his aft to support him kneads. Shockwave has no form of movement — he’s practically folded in half, nothing for him to thrust or gain leverage against, but he _loves it_. His frame is recuperating from its first overload already, fluid starting to dribble down from his twitching spike that’s extended. 

He can see their reflection in the glass of the one-way window, their colours announcing their halves of a whole, Shockwave’s valve — its colour still in the process of changing to blue through a series of internal commands — nestled between the white of his pelvis, Orion’s spike slipping up against it. His external node is swollen with increased energon flow, bumped by each pass of Orion’s spike. One of his hands grope down blindly to clutch onto Orion’s hip and Orion’s fans roar in response. 

Orion’s spike presses into him, huge and steady, and Shockwave is transfixed by the reflection as it sinks in. The plush of his valve welcomes it in greedily while its lubricant pools around the edges and runs down Orion’s thighs. Then the pleasure sparks through him and Shockwave feels his entire frame start to rattle with tremors. “Orion,“ he groans, and this time he has nothing to hide his face in. His face-plates are filling with a blush.

Orion rolls his hips up, his spike sliding deep and catching against the nodes soaking with charge. Shockwave’s body twitches in his grasp, overstimulation fading into a overwhelmingly-good edge instead, trying to buck down for Orion to move faster, to _frag_ him because he’s willing and open and dripping for Orion. He wants Orion to fuck him like he’s helpless, to fuck him until he can’t think and take it all out of Shockwave’s hands until he’s nothing but a mess of pleasure. 

As if hearing the plea, Orion thrusts hard enough for their metal to ring — and doesn’t hesitate to pursue the pace, break-neck, pounding into Shockwave’s spread legs while Shockwave arches as much as he can in his arms. Lubricant flecks from them with each unforgiving draw of Orion’s spike. Shockwave can’t imagine that another mech would be able to maintain the pace nor pose, but Orion does it with ease, pistoning into Shockwave until he does exactly what Shockwave has wanted and his processor scrambles into the chase for pleasure. 

He’s mewing in Orion’s hold, optics fighting against shuttering entirely as he rides out what Orion gives him. Orion’s own optics are flaring nearly white, his fans blasting out hot air as Shockwave’s cries become breathier and laden with static. He bounces in Orion’s hold, now heaved up and down, his own arms holding his legs to his chest as Orion grips his waist with both hands so Shockwave’s body will meet each of Orion’s thrusts.

He feels like a piece of debris in an ocean storm, churned up and thrown, caught in the exhilaration of a typhoon gale and tidal waves. When Orion hilts in him with a punched-out ex-vent and _oh_ and begins coming and each rush of transfluid is so forceful that Shockwave can feel Orion’s spike jerking inside him, Shockwave is powerless to crash through his overload. His vocaliser shorts out on a cry of _ORION!_ and his overflow tank spirals open to accept the hot spurts of Orion’s transfluid. 

Their overloads go on endlessly, Orion still flexing his hips so that his spike slides incrementally through his valve, and Shockwave jerks with the charge that sparks every time, gasping and rippling his valve. When Orion finally pulls out, his valve makes a small wet noise of release and only a trickle of transfluid leaves. Shockwave’s pedes are unsteady beneath him and he leans against the desk, turning around to face the smiling face of his Conjunx.

Baring his spark feels only natural.

Surprise crosses Orion’s expression for only a klik before he’s responding in kind. Their sparks swirl between them, reaching out, and this time it feels like falling into a warm sea. Orion’s essence swirls around him, easing their paths together as Shockwave sinks with open arms. The warmth of acceptance washes over him — unconditional love. Emotions swarm like visions. 

Duty and responsibility carved into a statue. A flying banner of command on a great flight of stairs that demand perseverance. A sky that reaches over the ends of the horizon, a spacecraft spiralling between the clouds. Shockwave can feel Orion’s entire spark glow with peace and the radiance of the sight.

And from Shockwave Orion draws a spool of ice, a cutting thread of doubt, doubt in himself and his motivations and his friends and his choices and his future, and Orion dips it through a sea of gold and watches it melt — and from that sea he takes a medallion instead to rest around Shockwave’s neck and tells him that he is precious.

Then the rush of dirt and metal under his wheels, mud splattering, windscreen wipers like the beat of his spark thundering cross the plains, engines’ bellows lost in the peal of thunder as the landscape is ablaze in the strike of lightning. Orion, driving, driving endlessly across where no other mechs dear to go, through caverns and ravines and mines high and low.

Shockwave parts on that image of his tenacity, their sparks releasing and untangling. 

As he comes to awareness, Orion tugs him into a kiss. His lips move, mouthing promises against Shockwave’s, and Shockwave echoes them in kind; and when they’re finished, they murmur sweet nothings over each other’s frames and trace words about how they’d live if they weren’t here but some other kind of place.

 

* * *

Shockwave reaches for a cloth kept on his desk, wiping down his thighs and Orion’s. Orion stirs against him, idly trailing an image with no head or end against his side. With each swipe, cleaning himself, Shockwave is a step closer back to reality. When he tosses it away into a nearby sink and turns into the bracket of Orion’s arms, his Conjunx is smiling.

“So smug,” Shockwave chides.

“But rightly.” Orion cups his arm and brings him forwards, upright and away from the desk. “Are you feeling alive enough to move now? I thought you were going to show me around.”

“I hope you don’t feel the need to christen my entire laboratory,” Shockwave says, fingers snapping signals more slowly than usual for the interior doors to be unlocked. “There are mechs in stasis in some of the rooms — those that I took from Dead End.”

“You’re doing well with them?”

Shockwave leans into Orion’s side and the arm that welcomes him in. “Better than I could’ve hoped. They’re weaning off all sorts of circuit-boosters, injuries and experimental dysfunctions — half of them just want to disappear into relinquishment clinics.”

“Relinquishment clinics?”

“Yes, ah–“ his valve is still a little sensitive when he stands and walks, waving Orion through one of the doors in his laboratory, towards his office. “Before they were regulated, though many of them still slip beneath the law, especially when senators will for it, they’d buy bodies for others to ride in.”

“So a temporary spark transfer.”

“Yes — but it’s very handy for temporary bodies to do _dirty work_.”

They enter his office, a small room that is impeccably tidy. There is a desk attached to a console, a fold-up berth from the wall, and a shelf filled with an assortment of polishes, instruments — a Nox’s cradle ticking away, a rotating spindle — photos of his outliers, and reams and reams of data-pads stacked together and ordered with tags. It’s ordered, yes, but the edges of his personality are visible within. 

But Orion’s focus is not drawn to any of those items, because — and Shockwave realises this with a small sense of embarrassment — he has failed to prepare the space for Orion’s arrival. Among his desk lie equally as many data pads as there are on the shelf, and a prototype of a pedestal for a small 3D projector is splayed half-wired in front of the desk. There is only one photo-frame on the table and it is of Orion, the picture Shockwave had taken where he is in recharge in his office, optics shut serenely in the fold of his arms. It’s a short recorded photo on loop; so it seems as though Orion is alive and sleeping gently through the small window of a frame. 

Orion has picked it up in a moment’s time, turning it over in his servos with an unreadable expression. Shockwave feels the need to explain. “I choose my favourite photo and change them every week,” — not true, he’s had that one there since he took it — “and-“

“Could you make one of you for me?”

“What?” Shockwave asks, even though he should’ve anticipated it. Orion has always been generous and welcoming of affection.

“Or a picture of us.” Orion turns it over again, where Shockwave has etched into the frame _Orion Lax - sleepycop_. “I’ve never seen one of these before. Did you make it yourself?”

“I did. And, well,” Shockwave says, gathering himself, “I’m sure I can take the time out of my busy schedule to arrange a photoshoot.”

When Orion looks up with an expression completely understanding, seeing straight through the flippancy — he’s just been in Shockwave’s _spark_ , of course he would know — Shockwave has to look away and fight a flush. 

He changes the topic while he can, swooping in to take a data-stick off the table. “This is also for you, if the circumstances arise.”

Orion takes and it and plugs it into his wrist port without even scanning it for viruses. Shockwave could splutter aloud, but Orion’s optics widen slightly and Shockwave is again forced to explain.

“Wills are usually kept elsewhere, I know — but it’s too likely that Sentinel as head of security has access to them. Pardon- Sentinel _Prime_.” He scoffs lightly. The Senate has been advertising that Sentinel has ‘tendencies of a Prime’ and that he’s ‘showing signs of the Matrix’s acceptance’, but obviously Shockwave knows the truth. They don’t even have the Matrix in their grasp. 

Yet there’s something concerning in it. Why provide Sentinel so much power?

“So in the event of my demise or inability to provide an answer, that’ll be yours to present,” Shockwave says. The data-stick contains all legal documents necessary for the handover of his assets, filled and signed by Shockwave, authorised with his personal Senatorial seal.

It’s not just for the sentiment. Proteus’ pursuit of him brought to light that perhaps Shockwave _should_ be concerned about some form of seizing both him and/or his research through unconventional, legal-loopholes. 

What happens behind the doors of his laboratory is secret to all. Shockwave had intended it to stay with him — and only him — but come morning and he’d realised that Orion could provide a solution for that as well. 

Even if Shockwave is killed, or disabled like Nominus Prime had initially been, nothing of his will fall into the hands of the untrustworthy. Orion will succeed his Senate seat, too, with all the wealth and power that it brings. Although his current status is objectionable, a sparkmate has all the rights to inherit; and Shockwave himself is a verified specialist so he’s attached all the frequency readings of his spark that will testify to their now-resonant frequencies.

He’ll need to take Orion’s. He waits for Orion to finish reading expectantly, to see if Orion will agree.

Orion does, but he seems stewing in his thoughts as Shockwave leads him to one of the side rooms. Some of the Dead-End mechs are still there on the many berths, so Shockwave keeps the lights on dim. He can feel Orion looking at them, peeling away from his side to observe but not touch the instruments lining the walls. Already the mechs look better, their plating not so pallid and gapless, no more wires sparking loose, but there is a weariness to them that even Shockwave can’t remove — the inevitability of a difficult future.

Shockwave unwinds the spark-reader from its console, sets the console camera to record, and simply stands there in the corner of the room beside, waiting. He can’t bring himself to disturb Orion when he looks over the resting mechs in his vigil, darkly silent, optics aglow. Perhaps he’s thinking about how many more of these mechs there are to save. How many more are still in Dead End now?

Diverting from his path, Orion comes to him. Shockwave draws a lead shelter partition around them and presses the monitor to his chest plates. “Hold these,” he says, and Orion’s fingers curl around his. Shockwave glances at the console — readings look standard, and the camera’s steady — glances back at Orion, flashes him a smile and kisses him quickly. Then he hurries over to the monitor and scans over his frequency amplitudes. The one that’d taken the forefront in Shockwave’s own readings is Orion’s zeroth harmonic too. It’s not often that the fundamentals line up even _for_ sparkmates. Usually one mate’s fundamental lines up as the other’s first or other harmonic.

It’s undeniable proof. Shockwave gestures that Orion can put the reader down and that he can wander while Shockwave busies himself at the console, marking it with a time-stamp and giving the command to be printed out in its proper presentation format.

It slides into his waiting hand, and he also takes the time to clip out the moment where he kisses the side of Orion’s helm, his smile bright and indulgent. He’ll turn those frames into the photo Orion wants.

“Shockwave,” Orion says, “who’s this?”

Shockwave will need to step back into his office, retrieve his official seals and mark the document before it can be uploaded onto the data-stick. 

“That’s Damus,” he says, looking over the print-out. “The empurata victim I mentioned to you.” It’s all in order. He walks up beside Orion, gently tips their helms together. “That’s his body. It’s just kept in here for storage.”

Damus’ body is an empty corpse. It lies on one of the pull-out cabinets in the corner of the room. Shockwave had gone to great ends to retrieve it. Orion doesn’t look away. Shockwave thinks that he must’ve been troubled, thinking that it was a mech from Dead End that had died under Shockwave’s hands. He isn’t wrong to worry about it. Shockwave would’ve been in tatters if one of them had.

“One day empurata will be a crime of the past and I’ll return this to him,” Shockwave says, and Orion winds their arms together and intertwines their fingers and squeezes in a silent promise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Orion Lax - sleepycop" is a nickname Shockwave gives from StarlightCaptivator's fic :D


	8. Chapter 8

“Do you know what Roller and Ratchet say?”

“I wasn’t under the impression that they liked me very much.”

Beside him in the shuttle, Orion, with his battle-mask on — they are technically in public, after all — glances at him. 

“Roller thinks that you’re stringing me along,” he says. Shockwave has grown more adept at reading Orion’s facial cues with or without the mask, and now he knows that Orion is darkly amused. “What were his exact words? Something about keeping me to show off. If he knew…”

“If he knew what?” 

“That you’re my Conjunx.”

Shockwave doesn’t bother stifle his smile. “I like hearing you say that.”

“In that case, I’ll say it again.” Orion takes his hand and presses their thumbs together, like a stamp. “You’re my Conjunx, Shockwave.”

“You could tell them, if it bothers you.”

“I could, and Roller would stop saying it, but he’d still _feel_ it. Ratchet, on the other hand, would try to convince me that as a Senator you have some way of creating a fake one-way spark bond.”

“Your friends don’t trust me at all,” Shockwave says, wryly. 

“ _I_ do,” Orion says. 

Warmth blooms through Shockwave, even though he had known, rationally, that it was true. Orion places a hand on his arm and Shockwave leans his helm against the glass, looking at Orion. 

“Do these windows shade?” Orion asks.

“They do, but the sky-spies find it suspicious. It’ll give enough grounds for a search warrant.”

Orion considers this as his thumb traces idle circles against Shockwave’s plating. 

Shockwave wants to kiss him too, but the odds of some mech seeing through the windows is too high — and Shockwave needs to keep Orion’s status as his Conjunx a secret. While the Senate may have qualms about killing Shockwave, they’d have none about killing _Orion_. He’d made the argument that it was for both their safeties, because killing one member of the bond would destroy the other through spark collapse.

“Can anyone see this?” Orion asks, one hand splaying over Shockwave’s thighs.

“No,” Shockwave says, but there’s a distinct tremble in his voice. 

“Make sure. We don’t want something so negligent to _ruin us_. Look outside, Shockwave. Tell me, is anyone watching?”

Shockwave tears his eyes away from the blue hands spanning the curve of his panel. The mechs out there are walking, hardly paying attention to them, and the sky-spies at their angles won’t be able to see how Orion. The is the portrait of the usual street-side. Other vehicles pass by.

“No,” he says. “They aren’t.”

But still his lines are buzzing with the danger of it. For all his escapades, he’s never interfaced in directly public. If someone looks, they’ll be able to see his face, his flushed expressions.

“Keep your spike inside. I’m going to finger you until you come,” Orion tells him. Shockwave’s valve clenches tight in anticipation and he bites down on a moan. “I’m going to make you come until you’re begging me to stop.”

Shockwave just spreads his legs a little wider, still upholding the facade of looking out the window, and allows Orion’s fingers into his sopping and eager heat.

 

* * *

When Orion stops the shuttle early and says that he wants to buy something, he leaves Shockwave waiting inside because he physically _can’t stand_. His legs are as weak as a turbo-fawn’s after Orion overloaded him thrice. 

But he does watch Orion go from the window. He slips into the crowd, as innocuous as every other citizen, his path already mapped out.

Shockwave feels like a compass needle thrown into flux, skittering crazily. How terrible it is to find something you love — something you want nothing more than to devote your every waking moment to — and know that it is locked behind legislation and the _world_ , the reality of having to keep in favour in the Senate, out of sight of the public, out of sight of even Orion’s friends and his own outliers.

How terrible it is to know that ultimately this profound love is but a speck in the face of the looming eclipse. None of his problems are closer to solving. Shockwave has only become happier… but it must be worth something. He tells himself that it must be worth something, but it isn’t, and if it is worth something, it is only his downfall.

His relationship with Orion does not stop an energon shortage; it does not stop the automation and monopolisation of energon; it does not stop the corruption of the Senate; it does not stop the burgeoning violence of the Decepticons; it does not stop the sky-spies that grow in number every day; it does not stop Sentinel’s slide toward being named Prime; it does not save Soundwave from Ratbat; it does not mean that Skywarp and Thundercracker can live as their own bots outside of Starscream’s side; it does not mean Damus can recover from his empurata; it does not mean that no more mechs will be killed in Dead End. It does not mean anything to the world at large.

And yet.

Orion returns, stepping out from the crowd, tapping on the door of the shuttle, and the whole world seems to brighten at his approach. Shockwave slides it open and Orion brings out two cubes from his subspace. 

“Since the bar by the memorial is always closed, I thought we could get some fuel on the way. You said you preferred a few drops of mercury in yours,” he says, offering it. Shockwave gives it a brief scan and is delighted.

“Ah- you remembered.” Orion’s own is copper-dusted. A mech of simple tastes, he’d said about himself. “Should we walk the rest of the way?”

“If you’re able.”

As they go, Orion asks where Shockwave’s travelled — and Shockwave replies that he’s been all over the globe, and it leads to Orion recounting his days in lower Iacon. He says that he’s familiar enough with the streets, even the unconventional routes, and begins talking about nearly being arrested by other law enforcement branches for breaking speed limits and entering prohibited spaces when he’s off-duty. He’s never off-duty, not really, Orion says. 

Just the other day he’d arrested people for beating up others just for having accents from _Tarn_. 

Shockwave attempts his best Tarnian accent. It makes Orion laugh behind the mask, and he’s still chuckling when they reach the monument and Orion sits and this time _he_ is the one that the chair’s rockiness thwarts. A generous splash of energon slops out of his cube, and Orion just wipes at it with the rag that’s already wet with Shockwave’s lubricants and Shockwave ends up being the one flushing. 

Orion sprawls in easy confidence of his strength and puts his hand over Shockwave’s when he sits, hiding their touch behind his legs. The simple touch warm Shockwave’s frame the whole way through.

“Accents from Tarn aren’t the most common thing,” Orion picks up again. “More of them brawl over accusations of being _informants_. Old grudges, petty rivalries, judgements — if a mech has an enemy, he claims they’re an informant to ostracise them. In which case they usually _become_ informants out of revenge.”

Shockwave ex-vents. He neither spends time nor has the opportunity to be out on the streets and witness what Orion does. “I do wonder if a hostile takeover is the solution. When the situation is like this, what else is there to do? Most of the senators themselves are inexperienced in battle — yet the mechs they are in charge of are. A hostile takeover, and then a declaration of peace.”

Orion thinks on that for a moment, and then he says, “There was an incident. Have you heard?”

“Decimus’?”

“The riot in the mines, yes, as the violent work of Decepticons.”

“Megatron threw a pick at him,” Shockwave says drily, and sees Orion’s optics widen, reach forward to touch his arm in alarm. 

“It was _Megatron_? They’re not going to punish him, are they?”

“He’s enough of a martyr as it is. He’ll be fine,” Shockwave says, but notes Orion’s uncharacteristic concern for Megatron. Perhaps this is just Orion’s consideration for others surfacing, though it feels more than the usual. Shockwave tamps down on a bud of irrational jealousy. “Now Decimus is stranded on _penal transport_ , waiting for rescue while — ironically — energon runs low.”

“It’s an announcement for a battle, what the miners did.”

“There have _been_ many battles before. It’s not new. The Senate pushes back,” Shockwave says, not exactly impressed, “and there’s only so much pushing until it _breaks_. If you’re going to kill them, kill them all at once. Do it in one devastating blow — and make sure they’re _dead_.”

 

* * *

“-We see rises in crime around our allotted districts,” Proteus says, “and so we must preserve the safety of our innocent citizens who do not engage in these foul acts. I propose _further identification_. Assign every mech an international numeric associated with their identity — travel between city states, major highways, and occupation must be accompanied by this. The mech in charge of this change would be none other than _Sentinel Prime_ , who has been more than dutiful in the wake of Nominus Prime’s passing.“

The plot is transparent as usual. Create another piece of _red tape_ for mechs to have to traverse through, give more mechs positions of power by manipulating this additional facet of ID, swindle more creds out of the population by forcing them to pay to have their ID verified — Shockwave sees the trajectory of Proteus’ plans with horrifying clarity. 

It is the first time since Ratbat’s party that there has been a Senate meeting. Shockwave sits in his seat and seethes. The mere sight of Proteus is enough to make him teem with fury. 

True to projection, the entire incident had been wiped away off the Grid. Shockwave suspects that Ratbat’s parties are now on undetermined _hold_ , however, but this will be the true test as to the recorrected popularity of Proteus and Ratbat. Shockwave does not have high hopes; Proteus’ policies, still, are directed for the private monetary gain of most members of the Senate. They’ve already proven themselves willing to overlook his more personal slights — and although attempting to _force a mech he’d been courting_ falls far beyond that, Shockwave does not have high hopes.

His processor wanders back to Orion’s words that so many of them have undoubtably forgotten by now. They are out of touch with reality.

However, curious and anticipatory gazes alight on him from all around the chamber when he rises to take the stand. “To summarise what we’ve heard from our fellow senator,” Shockwave begins, focusing his attention to his task. He addresses the Senate often; the sea of faces are familiar. What is not familiar, however, is the level of attention paid to him. “Senator Proteus proposes additional key identification required for the general public under the premise that it will reduce crime rates.”

He pauses for effect. If this were a scientific conference, he would easily bring data to accompany him, but in the Senate, decisions are largely made through oration abilities alone. Another glaring flaw in their system — as if there weren’t already enough. “This, of course, implies that crime is largely caused by mechs trespassing in cities that they’re not authorised to be in. But this _isn’t the case_. If you take to the streets, you’ll notice that crime arises mostly from mechs who are _already citizens_.”

“And if you don’t want to take my word for it, consider this — _you have something to lose_. If we decide that further identification and legislation is required for mechs to acquire _jobs_ , this creates a smaller pool for you to hire a workforce from.” Shockwave loosens his joints, pulls together an air of easy confidence. _Trust me_ , his body language says and watches eyes lap it up. “Did you enjoy cheaper labour? From Polyhex, perhaps, or Tarn? Instating this step towards more and more expensive barriers and you’ll see yourself _losing them_.”

Appeal to their greed. If Proteus wants to play, Shockwave is all teeth. He wants to see Proteus _pay_.

“You have something to lose,” he re-establishes, “and very little to gain. Fees and regulation of the identifications, as Senator Proteus so suggested, lie in _Sentinel Prime’s_ servos — not yours.”

He looks up. Still captain of security, Sentinel watches over from the upper floors, and unlike Proteus, Sentinel is obvious in his emotions, resentment clinging to every visible tension in his frame.

Shockwave nearly smiles.

He loathes this place. 

Eventually he resumes his place in the seats, and other senators step forth. Ratbat, Shockwave is surprised to see, voices agreement. He grasps on what Shockwave had introduced and tries to build on it. On further thought, Shockwave sees the logic in it. Ratbat does not have the same power as Proteus does. Shockwave’s blow to his pride — to his image of his trustworthiness — could have cost him more than Shockwave had anticipated. So here he grasps for some form of redemption, both by agreeing with Shockwave and because it _is_ for his own gain. 

Sentinel, even as Prime, does not have a say on the floor. At this, Shockwave can feel some sense of morbid satisfaction. Nominus was used by the Senate, pulled and strung around, too short-sighted to see what was gathering around him. The same strings hold, even when Sentinel is supposedly Prime. 

The danger of Sentinel is outside the Senate floors, the Primacy increasing his reach — and, by whatever twisted thing connects them, Proteus’. But that isn’t Shockwave’s concern for now. 

His concern for now is when the polling votes come in and the majority has been in favour of _rejecting_ the put forth proposal. They are somehow on Shockwave’s side, and he reels in that for a moment as the gathered senators file out. 

Dai Atlas catches him by the doors with a great big smile and then is obscured by the moving form of Proteus. “Shockwave,” Proteus says. “A word, if you please.”

Shockwave stops and folds his arms. They are out in the corridor, other senators still leaving around them but with no subtle amount of watching. Proteus couldn’t possibly threaten him here. Shockwave is not afraid. 

“I’m know we parted on unfortunate circumstances, but–“

Disgust slams into him, thicker and fouler than sewage. His wingtips flare in affront. How _stupid_ does Proteus think Shockwave is? “Go to _hell_ ,“ he snarls, jabbing his finger forward, seeing others watching his reaction, seeing the thunderous expression of Sentinel, and spins around to leave. Thankfully Proteus doesn’t try to physically stop him. Shockwave spends the rest of his exit from the building in a building rage. 

He’s calling Orion almost as soon as he gets off grounds, hailing a shuttle. Other senators are already leaving in their own when Orion picks up.

“Senator,” he says, and sounds tired. Shockwave’s rage immediately begins to abate. He assumes Roller is still in the office as well, because Orion only calls him by his title when others are around, and from there he can imagine Orion at his desk, dutifully packing up for the night before the curfew sets in. 

“Darling,” he replies — doesn’t dare say Orion’s name out loud when others could hear, “I’ve had the most terrible meeting.” He injects just enough of a whine into it that it loses its serious edge. He doesn’t want to worry Orion, not when Orion’s wrung out after a hard day’s work.

“Did you now?” He can hear a smile curling into Orion’s voice as well.

“Well, admittedly, it actually went quite _well_.” A shuttle pulls up for him, and he scans his palm-code into it before settling in and typing the address for his apartment. “Mechs sided with me to reject Proteus’ proposal. I never thought I’d see the day. He wanted to force more serial codes for every bot, and the procedures would have to be paid and signed through by Sentinel. Obviously it was awful, but it didn’t go through.”

“I’m glad,” Orion says. “What did you do?”

“Nothing out of the ordinary,” Shockwave says. “I assume it’s just the repercussion of what’d happened at Ratbat’s — Proteus is _uglier_ now. It’ll force his hand into making his bigger plays. I’m sure he has plans to come, and yet… he keeps— there’s no _gain_ in pursuing me, but he keeps attempting it.” Bewilderment seeps in. “I’d entertained the thought that it was really only lust. He’s too callous for me to assume his moves are impulsive, but he keeps _trying_ , Orion, and he’s _sloppy._ ”

“Did you record the session?”

“Oh— you won’t have to watch through the whole session. Here.” He sends Proteus’ brief encounter as a video file to Orion, and hears quiet from Orion’s end as the feed patches through. 

And then, “Can you show me all your past interactions?”

Shockwave does so with his usual efficiency, sending each one through in descending chronological order up until he feels is relevant. The file for Ratbat’s party is the security footage that Soundwave had sent, and the footage from having his paint stripped is corrupted, but he sends them off anyway, and as Orion watches them, he simply sits, listening to the sound of Orion’s venting as the city slips by in its dark strides.

“He _wants_ you,” Orion says. “Don’t you see the way he looks at you? He’ll have to _kill_ me first.”

“Orion,” Shockwave says, alarmed. 

“I’ll storm the Senate and personally _strangle_ him.” He hears Orion’s chair wheel back and Orion start to pace. “I can hardly bear it — the thought of you having to run like that again. What he’s done to you is a _horror_ , Senator!”

“I won’t be caught,” Shockwave reassures, though he feels cold inside. “In ways, this is a boon. If he _wants_ me, he won’t _assassinate_ me.” His chuckle is faintly hysterical. “And if he catches me, he can’t bond with me. It’s a relatively fortunate turn of events.”

“Doesn’t it sicken you?”

“It sickens me until I want to purge my tanks without end, love. Trying to look for the silver linings is what keeps me _sane_ — and having you on call, of course. I was terribly upset before I heard your voice.”

“I miss you too, Shockwave.” Orion says it quietly, and Shockwave curls up and wishes he were here.

“I do wish you were here,” he admits miserably. “I wish I didn’t go home to an empty apartment — it makes me want to stay at the Academy and work until I fall asleep at my desk, hoping that for some reason you’ll stop by.”

“I hate to hear that. I’m up to my neck in work.”

“No — it’s alright. You couldn’t come that often anyway. It’d be suspicious.”

Shockwave calls Orion nearly every day at this point, and if he overworks and misses the usual time that he rings, Orion worries and tries to contact him, and every time he hears Orion’s voice, his spark whirls faster. 

“I didn’t want our bond to make your miserable,” Orion says, voice still lowered.

Shockwave is quick to correct him. “You misunderstand — Orion, you’re the best thing in my life.”

He hears Orion’s in-vent hitch, and how Shockwave _loves_ to shower him in honest affection. He wants to say something just as whole-sparked to melt him but then a priority ping makes itself known. It’s his contact from within Sentinel’s ranks. It’s not the oddest time they’ve met, so Shockwave hurriedly types their usual meeting location into the shuttle’s navigation. It’ll only be a short detour.

“Where are you now?” Orion is asking. Shockwave already know that he’s thinking of returning the affection with a grand gesture of his own — visiting Shockwave to grant him his dear wish.

But he shouldn’t. “One of my contacts wants to see me,” Shockwave says. “Do you want me to keep you on the line?”

“Yes,” Orion says. Shockwave can hear a clatter from his end, assortments being packed up. He hears Roller saying something, and Orion move the phone away to reply with _Bite me, Roller_. He returns with, “If you don’t want me listening in, tell me. I just want to know when you’ll be done.”

“It shouldn’t take long,” Shockwave says. “I have no secrets from you — unless you count the scientific ones, but those aren’t for the want of trying.”

“I think I understood the quantum entanglement fine last time.”

“Sweetspark, at the end you told me photons were only _particles_. Leave the crazy thinking up to me. Even if my work falls into your hands, pass it over to Skids.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Orion says, his smile audible, and Shockwave feels a flush of pride that he could’ve turned around that initial exhaustion so easily. 

The shuttle pulls over, and Shockwave steps out. The streets are mostly empty at this time because it’s not a residential district and the bots have already headed home to miss the curfew. He walks alone, listening to Orion argue in the background about the possible location for the headquarters of a swindling operation. 

_We haven’t considered if the tracks were falsified_ , Orion is saying.

_But we checked. They were real burned rubber_ , Roller replies. 

The dark tilted lines of the streets are not intimidating when he has Orion in his audials. Street lamps are small spheres of light in an underwater sea and Shockwave slips through like a sliver of a silver-blue fish, strangely comforted.

The events of his day play past. He’s been working on an independent contract for designing stronger armour for mini-bots specifically, flirting between different combinations of metals, sending samples to his contractor and listing out options from flexibility, upkeep, costs, brittleness, hardness, and so forth. His outliers take on other research contracts too, or even investigation. A few branches of forensics and material analysis come to them from time to time because they’re a verified and trusted institution. 

_We only tested the start of the trail. Remember where it disconnected around the corner, after the energon store?_

Shockwave turns into the alleyway where he meets his corresponder, and the scent of energon hits him immediately. It is blacker than a corridor, but Shockwave can see the glisten of light catch against energon seeping around the pedes of a bot standing there under the dying light. 

Sentinel Prime looks up. The decapitated helm of Shockwave’s contact falls from his hands. “Expecting someone?”

Shockwave barely gets further than a step before he is thrown backwards, rough fingers around his throat. The world twists and he is being dragged down, further into the alley, the walls too tall, everything suddenly choking. He claws at the servos strangling him, spitting and snarling and trying to plant his pedes against Sentinel’s legs and fire his thrusters but they glance off Sentinel’s plating without so much a dent. 

Orion shouting in his audials, _Shockwave–! Shockwave- what’s happening?!_

He’s slammed into the walls and feels one of the lines in his neck burst. Energon spurts out between them; Shockwave splutters static when it hits him that _this_ was the bot that murdered Nominus Prime — the bot that cleans up all of Proteus’ spills and _that is what Shockwave is now_ , a mess on Proteus’ part, and he’s going to _die_.

But this can’t be, it can’t be, Shockwave has to–

The sound of his scream is shrill and terrible and rips from his throat when Sentinel grips one of his servos and just _crushes_ it in his grasp. It gives up with no resistance, plating and wiring and circuit-boards distending inwards.

“You–“ he gasps, and Sentinel, holding him down with one hand around his neck, starts working his way up Shockwave’s wrist, twisting the plating there, tearing it apart with his monstrous fingers.

“I’m going to enjoy watching you die,” Sentinel says.

_Shockwave, please— answer me! Where are you?_

“You know,” Shockwave grits out, “at first I was confused why I wasn’t dead, why Proteus didn’t–“

His helm is rammed against the wall again and one of his optics spark out from the impact, energon spraying from it as the sensitive lens bursts from the pressure impact. “Don’t say _his name_.”

“What, this dirty alley in Iacon-15 isn’t worthy enough to say _Proteus_ in?”

His arm is ripped off for that. It strains at the seams and the metal flexes and then comes off, wires exploding in thousands of signals for pain that send Shockwave howling until Sentinel tightens around his neck and the noise cuts off with a crackle. 

Sentinel’s expression is terrifying — an enormous face looking down, painted wet with energon from the mech he’s murdered.

“He wants me _alive_ ,” Shockwave chokes out, vents heaving steam. “Because he _wants_ me. Is your _petty jealousy_ going to override his wishes?”

Sentinel’s optics are like glittering coals, so hard that they seem alien. 

“You’ll _never_ get him if you kill me!” Shockwave spits and begins his struggle anew. “He’ll loathe you forever! Isn’t that one great joke?!”

Orion shouting in his ears. _I’m nearly there Shockwave hang in there I’ll kill him I’ll KILL him!_

Sentinel’s fingers grab his helm and begin to crush, and Shockwave’s fear leaps when he realises Sentinel might be too far gone, too impossibly angry to even consider what Shockwave’s saying. The pressure against his helm is immense, plating starting to bend and pop and critical punctures opening–

Diagnostic feeds fly into his vision and churn readouts that the puncture is five micrometers from his _processor_ itself. Shockwave is going to die; he realises this now. For all his precautions, it’d never _really_ occurred to him, and now he stares it straight in the livid and enraged face-

Shockwave opens his throat and sputters it all out— “He’ll hate you he’ll hate you and you’ll never get him even if you kill me, you _idiot_ —“ But his words dissolve into nothing but a white-hot pitch of _screaming_ as the pain lances through him, twisting barbed wire down his throat that splits his vision in two.

Then the pressure is gone, wrenched from him like being ripped out drowning, and there is a _helicopter_ there above the alley, its floodlights burning his optics. It’s the regional police enforcement hovering with the enormous roar of beating rotors, and he can hear Orion’s shouting in real-time as he has Sentinel in a choke, pulling him away from Shockwave. 

Shockwave staggers upright, feeling as though he’s in some frame that’s not his own. Everything is too surreal, and he knows that he’s in shock because he’d been a klik away from death. Energon spills hot over his frame and his arm lies disconnected on the floor and there’s a body still not a metre away. But when he looks at Sentinel, his senses come rushing back, boiling with rage. All he knows is that he wants this mech in front of him to _hurt_.

“Do you know what I see?” His offlined optic sparks madly and his voice is half static. “You’re _ugly_. You’re _brutish_ , you’re _stupid_ and disgustingly transparent —“ 

Sentinel’s optics are burning. Shockwave’s world wavers, energon loss close to hitting its functional limits.

“Don’t you realise?” Shockwave says, gripping onto the wall, then resets his vocaliser to snarl, “ _Proteus_ **hates** _you_! And you follow him so blindly!” Other officers are grabbing Sentinel now, pulling him away. Orion breaks away to stride over to Shockwave, who somehow still has Sentinel’s gaze, locked on each other, knowing every word of his is heard, and he roars with every last drop of energon still in his lines, “ _HATE HIM BACK_!”

 

* * *

Shockwave wakes up on a medical berth not his own to see the disgruntled face of Ratchet peering over at monitors by his berth. It’s not Dead End clinic, but Iacon Hospital, where Ratchet works in the day — and it is the day. His chronometer tells him that a few days have passed while he’s been in stasis. “Here I thought I’d be coming online in Orion’s arms,” he groans.

“Don’t even _start_ with me,” Ratchet says. “Do you know where he is now? In _custody_ because of the stunt you pulled.”

“What?” Shockwave hauls himself upright like the quintessential awful patient, plugs popping from his frame. 

“Sentinel has half the police force in custody.” Ratchet shoves him back down. “Is that what you wanted?”

“I’ll get him out.” His words are laced with vicious promise. How _dare_ Sentinel. First he tries to kill Shockwave, and then he takes _Orion away_. Shockwave will free him if it’s the last thing he does. 

“I’m starting to think that this is awful _convenient_ for you.” Shockwave notices that the door of the med-bay is locked shut with a pin lock, and that Ratchet is the only medic in here with him. “You _picked_ Orion. He’s the only one who could’ve gotten there so fast — and brought half Iacon’s police force with him because they’re old friends.”

“You think I arranged this?” Shockwave says. “You think– you think _I_ arranged this from the very start?” He splays a hand over his chest. “You think I was even the one who killed his officers?”

Ratchet snaps, “He’s _obsessed_ with you!” 

Shockwave stares. “And I’m obsessed in return. What’s the issue?”

“You’re already _skewing_ his judgement,” Ratchet says. “I don’t know what sort of plan you have in store–“

“I don’t _understand_!” Shockwave explodes. “What do you _want_ from me?! If I stay away you’d tell me it’s for leading him on — I contact him and you tell me I’m fuelling an _obsession_! Is your spark so frigid you’ve never fathomed loving any bot? For a goddamn minute just _leave us be_!”

“I _can’t_!” Ratchet shouts back, his grip on a scalpel now threatening to snap it. “You think _my_ neck isn’t on the line too here? To me it looks like Orion keeps leaping head-first into the Senate’s affairs and you’re just happy to let him do it! He runs off to Ratbat’s party! He spends more time than’s safe with you! And now _this_! What am _I_ going to do if he gets caught out? He’s my _friend_ , you scrapheap — and I’ve got secrets contingent on him as well! Think about what other mechs you’re dragging into this mess!”

“If I spend all my time thinking about all these mechs in this mess I’ll _crash._ How many do you think I’m responsible for? Because, Ratchet, if you want to delve into the guts of things, you’ll find that count up into the hundreds!”

“But if he’s so damn important to you, he should come above that! Why can’t you fragging _prove it_? What I see is take and take and _take_ and no _giving_ on your end!” 

“I don’t owe you any explanations, Ratchet — don’t try to _demand_ them from me.”

“You think you don’t?” An accusatory hand points, half-shaking, at the door. “Because then you’ll find that the door doesn’t open — and I’ve disabled your internal comms too, so good luck getting out when I have you reportedly requiring _heavy medical care._ ”

“And here I thought you were _honest_ , Doctor. What evidence are you basing that off at all?” Shockwave says, but his processor is spinning with the need to find a solution. Orion _needs_ him. Shockwave… he can probably arrange something with Proteus that will benefit Sentinel and have Orion released. He can try pull the wool over both their eyes. But to do that he needs to leave the damn medical bay. 

“Spark aberration,” Ratchet says. “It’s true, you have one. Your frame’s fundamental frequency is resonating at a different one your spark is. The closest thing I’ve seen to it is _body-gloving_ — like your frame could reject your spark any klik.”

Shockwave is genuinely caught out, because when he’d taken his reading, it was all completely in order. Had Sentinel done something to him?

But it isn’t something to worry about for now. He’ll check it later in his own lab. For now he needs to leave. 

He gestures at the tele-screen in the upper corner of the room. “Turn it on.”

“Why?”

“Why _not_? Just because I said it? Because I’ll use its radio waves to brainwash you? I want to see what’s happening to _Orion_ , you confounded medic.”

But Ratchet does turn it on, and what greets them isn’t the law enforcement’s crisis, but a stricken mech talking about the return of Decimus and his subsequent capture by Decepticons. Security footage shows a parade, a great statue unveiled for Decimus for managing to return from penal transport alive, and—

That’s _Skywarp,_ Shockwave realises in horror. His outlier Skywarp, teleporting in to snatch away the senator, and that’s Starscream, carpet-bombing the rest of the gathered mechs. And that is Thundercracker booming overhead, rattling mechs and jamming comms and weapons. The the footage cuts away, back to the anchor talking about Sentinel heading straight to the gladiator arena where Megatron has the senator captured. Although the police force were temporarily on strike, the anchor says, Sentinel Prime has negotiated circumstances with them so that-

“You _lied_ to me!” Shockwave spits, helm turning to glare down Ratchet. “They aren’t in custody. They’ve been freed because Sentinel _needs_ them to clash with the Decepticons.”

“No—“ Ratchet says. “I didn’t know about this. This is a new development. He must’ve just given the order.”

Shockwave has enough faith in the idea that Ratchet doesn’t lie unless absolutely required to, and Ratchet is staring at the screen with surprise that doesn’t seem feigned. But Shockwave’s anger bubbles at the thought that Ratchet had been intending to keep him away from Orion just as every other mech has.

“I can’t believe you,” Shockwave says lowly. “You claim to be his friend and you tried keep me away from helping him because of your own _paranoia_.”

“A paranoia that’s saved my aft for the last few vorns and that’s shared by more than one mech, thank you,” Ratchet responds drily.

And all of a sudden Ratchet scowls at the door, strides over, and opens it with the pin, and in bursts Orion. 

He doesn’t look injured, just terribly terribly angry, and he takes three long steps before he reaches the berth and he has Shockwave pulled into his arms. Shockwave clutches him close, his whole spark suddenly unmoored like it’s floating. _Orion is here_. Orion’s facemask retracts and he buries his helm against the top of Shockwave’s.

They are locked like that for a long moment, Shockwave feeling their frames resonate in time, relax, horrors dripping away. When he readjusts his position slightly, he sees Ratchet staring at them, something unreadable flickering across his expression. Ratchet has seen them together only once, Shockwave recalls, and only briefly.

“Shockwave,” Orion murmurs, just tasting his name, and Shockwave gives him his full and undivided attention. “It’ll haunt me, hearing you scream, thinking you were going to die right there on the other side of the line.” He clutches onto Shockwave tighter. “Not like that. Not alone, scared – in panic and in pain.” 

“It _does_ terrify me every time we part,” Shockwave says.

Orion ex-vents as though releasing every thread of his anger. He releases him momentarily to sit on the edge of the medical berth and Shockwave clambers right into back into his arms as soon as he does. “Aren’t we an awful cliché?” Orion says. He means the eon-old Cybertronian formula for love stories, where a pair of lovers reluctantly part, face hardship, and come together once more to vow that they will never again leave each other’s sides.

Ratchet looks very busy over at the consoles, deliberately giving them privacy. Shockwave is surprised, but then not really — Ratchet respects Orion far too much; though when Ratchet catches his eye, he thinks he sees _guilt_.

“We are, but it isn’t awful,” Shockwave admits. His fingers tangle with Orion’s. He can feel Orion, alive and warm and his frame still running, his familiar edges and familiar pulse of his spark. Nothing in this world can replace him.

“It terrifies me, too,” Orion breathes by his audial, raw and brokenly honest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "I think only Roller and I knew that Pax had a *contact* within the Senate.  
> “Roller used to tease him about it: ‘He’s stringing you along, Orion! You’re his *go-to ‘bot* when he wants to *show off*, and you *love* it.’ Typical Roller.” - Ratchet, mtmte, issue #9.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Your friend is in danger.”  
> “My friend? Which friend?”  
> “I don’t know his name. He’s a _Senator_. They know he _fraternizes_ with you and that he’s working against them—against the Senate. They’re gonna _kill him._ ”  
> — OP & Whirl, mtmte, issue #10

 

 

A few weeks later, the spectrum analyser tells him that Ratchet had been correct. Shockwave tests, and then tests again, and checks his equipment three times. There’s another frequency peaking in his spark readings — it has two major peaks outside the usual fundamental and its harmonics. He can’t fathom what’s happening inside. His _frame’s_ frequency is still compliant with the value it had been before. It’s only his spark.

Which explains why he’s on his medical berth, looking up at the mirror that is held by an automated arm at his own spark chamber. What he sees is alarming. His spark appears to be bulging and _splitting_ in a growth like an organic tumour, swirling with his spark’s energy. His instinct is to remove it. He doesn’t know what it is, and has never heard of anything like it in all his scientific pursuits. It could be dangerous. 

He straps his legs and torso down, manoeuvring tools with his hands, optics fixed on the mirror and several other camera feeds from different angles that he sets up by the berth. Obviously he should consult a specialist, but Shockwave doesn’t know any specialist that he trusts enough to bare his spark to.

The aberration shies away from the encroaching probe and skitters behind his spark. Shockwave huffs. When he withdraws the probe slightly, it peers back, and Shockwave decides that this is an endeavour best left to another day. He needs more specialised equipment if he wants to handle something like this. Yet still, he wonders about the source. The only thing his spark’s been exposed to recently is Orion’s, and he dismisses that as the source. All spark mates merge constantly, and there have been hundreds of millions of them around the globe in history. If spark-merges caused some sort of strange disease, it would’ve long been recorded.

So Shockwave is left with no answers. His tentative assumption is some form of unique illness that has been jump-started by Orion’s spark-merging and the increased energy flowing to it. It might not be malignant, and he’s somewhat afraid that attempting to remove it could cause it to react negatively with his spark. He’ll leave it where it is, for now. 

He packs away the mirrors and cameras, pushing the discomfort away, and rifling through the set of new orders that have registered. There are at least ten packages in his shipping bay. When he spots one request for a encrypted safe to be opened, he decides that it’s perfect for Damus and hefts it into his arms. The details explain… that it’s a safe that’d been stolen from an upper-class mech, and while the thief had been apprehended, the lock had been mangled and automatic safeties engaged. The upper-class mech can’t open it to retrieve his ID that he hopes is still in there, the original manufacturers for the safe have closed down, and no lock-pickers are trusted.

Shockwave looks the model over — very expensive, but that’s to be expected. Dura-steel. Blasting it open isn’t an option without ruining what’s inside. It’s exactly a job that he’d give to Damus. He takes the package with him outside the lab, eyeing the immense sum that the mech promises as compensation. 

Damus’ usual lab is empty when he arrives — it’s late enough that this isn’t unusual —, though the doors open when he scans the back of his hand because Shockwave has access to every room in the building, no matter its locked states. He places the package on one of the benches and leaves. He could message Damus, but the path back just happens to cross his room, so Shockwave will just step in briefly there. He can inquire into the progress of his powers as well.

The door opens, Shockwave looks in, “Damus, I’ve left–“ and stops. Damus _is_ there, but his legs are hooked around Skid’s shoulders, the entire berth rocking as Skids pounds into his exposed aft and the little orange mech practically sobs into his thrusts. 

They freeze.

Shockwave backs out the doors, mortified. “I’m terribly sorry,” he says as the doors shut, and walks away as fast as he can while still being considered proper.

His outliers are _interfacing_. He looks for an explanation, realises that it’s been glaringly obvious, and feels mortified again. Shockwave is no stranger to sex, certainly not with his exploits, but mechs that he knows and works with–

He’ll knock from now on.

When he returns to his laboratory, he signals out the tele-screen that unfolds to take his mind off- _things_. The usual reports about rioting are there and they dissolve into commendations for Sentinel’s men handling it so skilfully. Shockwave is tempted to change the channel, but doesn’t, because this is what he turned the screen on for.

It switches again. Proteus’ Promise has been airing for the last few weeks. Proteus stands there, a hand over his spark, speaking about his Decepticon Registration Act. If at least ten thousand Decepticons register their names, Proteus claims, he’ll grant them political party status. It closes in a few days. Shockwave is doubtful. He doubts even a _hundred_ Decepticons would put their faith into Proteus. 

Especially after the recent attack. Decimus has been retrieved from the terrorist Decepticons, and they’re smeared even further as villains in media. Proteus stands out oddly, but Shockwave can’t bring himself to believe this isn’t intentional. 

He checks his chronometer. It’s probably time for him to head home before curfew. He glances in at the orders still waiting, at his incubating trial world-seeds, and closes all the lights, packs away any equipment, and washes it down. He backs up all his data, checks that all empty energon cubes have been properly disposed, pauses one last time to look at the photo of sleeping Orion, and finally locks up.

From the cameras, he checks that all the windows to the laboratories are closed, all their lights off, and then he locks the building as he leaves and hails a shuttle to make his way home. He isn’t kept waiting for long until one pulls up.

He recharges most of the ride there. He plans for an early start tomorrow, and re-charge and de-frag cycles, even short and interrupted ones, are better than nothing. 

The familiar block of his apartments comes into view. The doors slide open to admit him as he enters, and he waves at the receptionist. He doesn’t wave back. Shockwave stops, looks, and realises that it’s no longer the monitor he’s familiar with, but a different stern-faced mech. 

“Excuse me,” Shockwave says, coming to lean against the counter, “when had the building staff changed?”

“Effective as of this afternoon,” the mech says. 

He’d _liked_ the last receptionist. It was a relatively high-paying job for a monitor alt-mode. He dreads to know what happened and wonders why he hadn’t been notified. “Why was there a change?”

“Handover of building proprietorship.”

Shockwave says, “Repeat that.”

“Handover of building pro-“

“ _Who_?” Shockwave asks, ice forming in him. “I was under the impression that these apartments were independently owned.”

The mech holds up a data-sheet. “Effective as of today, 1402. This building, and all housing units wherein, are under the ownership of Senator Proteus.”

“That’s _slag_. He can’t–”

The mech produces a data-slug and offers it to him. “All appropriate transactions and legislation recorded within, with the acting Prime’s personal seal of approval. You will find yourself recompensed for the expense of your housing unit, and all further charge for the rental of Senator Proteus’ property will be billed accordingly.”

Shockwave takes it — and crushes it in his fingers. Without another word he spins on his heel and storms out. His _home_. 

The shuttle is still waiting for him outside, and for a wild moment he considers just walking all the way, but curfew has passed, and Shockwave remembers the last time he was walking the streets after dark. 

He could _scream_. 

Proteus rages a war on him. It’s hopeless to believe that his home hasn’t already been ransacked and looked through by Proteus or his mechs, and while he’s fortunate that he keeps nothing incriminating in it, he’s lost his home to Proteus and Sentinel. 

Shockwave does scream, then. He slams his hands on the side of the shuttle and just howls his fury. What was _his_ was bought through nothing but stolen creds and numbers! What was _his_ — where he had retired day after day for years — _taken_! How could he return to one of the few places he felt safe in to find it _violated_?!

The price of his safety must’ve been so _meagre_. The only place he has left is the Academy, and now he feels constricted, shattered by the knowledge that the Academy will be their next target. 

And it’s _money_. Primus forbid it all. Proteus uses money and the overruling role of Sentinel’s Primacy to take it from him. Not through a fight, not through spilt energon and the grittiness of knowing Shockwave fought back, but like _this_ — for him to return after a long day of work to hear from some nameless mech that he’s lost something important to him. 

What is this all even in the name of? Payback? Shockwave doesn’t know anymore. At first he thought it was for political power. Then he thought it was for Proteus’ personal lust. Now, he’s lost. Careening. Shockwave can fight his battles and he can take his wins, but at the end, what he does rarely seems to _amount_ to anything. He’s scooping out water with his servos while the boat is filling. What he manages to strike back at Proteus seems so inconsequential.

The world is still slipping out of his hands.

And he realises this as the shuttle trundles towards the Interstate Bridge because he sees a body hanging from the side. 

The streets are cold, and he shouldn’t be outside, but that body is familiar and he has to step closer and has to confirm. Because it’s Sherma. Senator Sherma, hanging from the bridge. The image of it will be forever burnt into his eyes, but then he tears himself away with his processor firing crazily.

Shockwave sends off an emergency ping to law enforce marking where he is, where his shuttle is parked beneath the swaying body of Sherma. Then he’s clambering back into the shuttle, dialling into his comm. “Momus,” he says, as soon as the other mech picks up. “Where are you?”

“Shockwave?” Momus asks. They’re never been on the friendliest of terms, but at the very least Shockwave would call them acquaintances. “I’m nowhere particular. Just at home. What’s the matter?”

“Stay there. Lock your windows. Alert security, Momus, they–“

“Is this about Sherma?” Momus asks, and Shockwave can hear his voice climbing in pitch, the faintest edge of complete blinding panic. 

And Shockwave doesn’t know what to tell Momus. He sits there in the shuttle, lost for words.

“Is that why isn’t he home yet? Shockwave?”

“Someone’s… _killed_ him, Momus. And if you’re not careful, they’ll be coming for you next–“

“No,” is all that his fellow Senator says. “No, no, no, tell me it isn’t true, Shockwave. Please.”

“I’m so sorry,” Shockwave says. “I’m so sorry.” 

“They _can’t_ have killed him! Tell me it isn’t true, Shockwave! _Please_! It wasn’t him! It wasn’t him–! It was _me_ — oh god, oh god.” He hears Momus sink to the floor. 

“Momus, you need to get somewhere safe now. Please.”

“Why him?” Momus sobs. “It was _me_. They killed him because they thought he was a Decepticon, didn’t they?”

Shockwave doesn’t know, but Momus takes his silence for an affirmative. His wail, even though the line, is haunting. 

“Why did they kill him?!” Momus demands, vocaliser crackling. “He didn’t do anything wrong! _Why_ , Shockwave?! WHY?!” 

The shattering of glass on the other side of the line is the last that Shockwave hears of him before the phone he must’ve been using clatters to the ground and all he hears is screaming and gunfire. He sits in the silence of his shuttle until he sees red and blue lights pull up around him, and exits from the vehicle, arms up.

Sentinel’s second in command stands there, Prowl, a white-painted mech with a scowl on his face. 

“Translucentica Heights,” Shockwave says. “There’s another related murder happening there right now. Cuff me. Go.”

Prowl shoots him a distrustful look, but a nod from his partner seems to spur him on.

“You’re coming with us,” Prowl says, no-nonsense. It makes sense. If he is a suspect, even if he was the one who pinged the alert, they don’t want him leaving, and he clearly know more about the situation than they do. 

Shockwave doesn’t say a word to them. Just bows his head replaying the last words of Momus over and over as they bring him to their vehicles and make for their destination.

Prowl is speaking in code to his partner, Chromedome, and Shockwave — if he wanted — could easily decrypt it and could also probably escape the cuffs, but he doesn’t have the energy to. He slumps in his seat, behind Prowl on his Skydart, as Iacon flashes past, and they pull into Translucentica Heights, the living place of the elite, and Shockwave feels a burst of bitterness at the thought that he’d always refused to live there, picked some other modest home for himself, and it’s _backfired on him_ , when a body crashes out from the upper levels. 

Momus hits the ground without a head, a Decepticon insignia planted on his body. A distant boom — a flier disappears overhead and Chromedome guns off on chase. 

Prowl takes them upwards on the Skydart to the broken window, and they land in a corridor.

Shockwave finds himself dragged forward by Prowl, or urged, rather, because Prowl is far shorter and smaller than him. It’s with dark resentment that he notes Sentinel must’ve chosen this mech as his second because he’s physically so much weaker.

They’re admitted entrance into Momus’ home when Shockwave scans his ID — a Senator always offered passage — and then Prowl is standing surveying the scene. Shockwave stands and glowers in the doorway. As far as he’s concerned, it’s too late. Momus is dead, and it seems like he’d been a Decepticon, or at least a Decepticon sympathiser. It’s enough of a motive for Sentinel to have them killed.

Momus’ home is a broken mess, gunshots sunk into the walls and their rubble scattering the once-polished floor. The lights are still on. Datapads lie scattered and shattered and Shockwave spots the phone that Momus had dropped. 

Shockwave projects every inch of this resentment towards the bot opposite him, but Prowl is too deep in thought to acknowledge him.

“It’s obvious to you, too, isn’t it?” Shockwave says, gesturing with his cuffed hands. “It’s painted to be murder by _Decepticons_ — but that’s too bland. Too banal. You know it’s never easy with the Senate.”

Chromedome bursts in after them, and Prowl ignores Shockwave entirely to tell him to stay back. 

“Clearly, you let him get away,” Prowl says, after a moment.

“He’s dead, actually.”

“Dead?”

“He crashed. And you know what? He deserved it — he was an _appalling_ flier.”

Prowl looks up at his partner. “I see. In that case, I apologise.”

“Typical! _You never_ back down, even when you’re–“ Chromedome pulls a double-take. “What?”

“I said I’m _sorry_. And I’m glad you weren’t hurt.”

“I— right. Okay, good…”

“Are you finished with your day show?” Shockwave asks. Chromedome turns to him, but Prowl seems determined to ignore him. “Momus was a _Decepticon_ — Sherma was his lover and essentially a sympathiser. Does that provide enough motive for you now?”

“How do you know this?” Prowl asks sharply, looking up.

“How _don’t_ you?” Shockwave demands. “You’re Sentinel’s second in command, but all that I’ve seen so far is _fumbling in the dark_. You’re right there next to him and you don’t realise that _he_ is the likeliest murderer!”

“I don’t prescribe to insane doctrine,” Prowl says levelly. “Unless you have proof of anything you say–“

Movement skitters across the apartment. The first bullet punches straight through Chromedome’s arm and for all that Prowl irritates the bolts off Shockwave, Shockwave barrels into the small yellow mech before the second shot can get anywhere close and they go skidding behind an overturned table. He sees Prowl dive for cover and the attacker has transformed into his alt-mode, hovering outside another broken window, raining in blaster fire.

Shockwave, obviously, is in cuffs and doesn’t even have a weapon. Across him, Prowl has locked up although Chromedome is valiantly attempting to return fire. 

“What are you _doing_?!” Shockwave shouts over at him.

“I don’t know! I’ve never…”

“He’s never been in a fight!” Chromedome answers, and Shockwave’s impression of Prowl plummets even further. 

Shockwave transforms his fingers into their usual picks and begins making quick work of the cuffs, intent on taking Prowl’s blaster from him, but then there’s a loud _crunch_ from outside and Orion has landed on the flier’s hood, punching through his wing and demanding him to land. 

The cuffs clatter to the ground. Shockwave leaps out the window right after Orion and transforms. Alt-mode exempt or not, he doesn’t care, and shoots down towards the earth after Orion like a drill head, the sonic barrier erupting around him and leaving twin streams that curl like a helix over his wings. He transforms a step away from the ground and lands just in time to see Orion shout _No!_ and the spark of the attacker collapse. 

Then Orion sees Shockwave and they’re reaching for each other in tandem. Orion’s hand curls around his arm with a surprising sort of desperation. “Someone told me you my ‘senator friend’ was going to be killed,” Orion says. “When I heard– I thought it would be you.”

“Not yet,” Shockwave says. He turns his helm towards the fallen body of Momus, not too far away. “He was a Decepticon, Senator Momus.” Orion’s optics widen in surprise.

Chromedome and Prowl arrive in a hurried clatter. Prowl has a hand clasped over his partner’s wound. “I suppose you think that was _clever_? Playing the hero! When _ordinary citizens_ start taking the law into their own-“ 

Orion straightens and Shockwave feels a flush of pride. “My name is _Orion Pax_. Read my palm: I’m a registered law enforcer.” His ID expands for all of them to see. “You must be Prowl. I’ve heard a lot about you. I’d _assumed_ most of it was exaggerated.”

Prowl deflates slightly. He starts pulling out equipment from his subspace instead. “I’m sending a preliminary report to Flatfoot.”

“It’ll get ‘lost’, trust me. It’s in the Senate’s interests to incite _anti-Decepticon_ rage.”

At least Shockwave and Orion are on the same page. 

“Well, I hope I never get to be as _jaded_ and cynical as you, Orion Pax.”

“Why only a preliminary report, Prowl?” Chromedome asks, and Shockwave watches as they discuss the mech’s death.

Spark rejection, Orion says, repeating the words that Shockwave had once told him about body-gloving. He says it with more confidence now, because Shockwave knows — they update each other about what goes on in their lives practically every day — that he’s run into more cases of criminal body-gloving. 

Shockwave has a map of the area pulled up before contacting Roller is even necessary. “The nearest relinquishment clinic is opposite the shrine of Solomus,” he says. 

“We’re not going,” Orion says. 

“Chromedome’s injured!” Prowl snaps back.

“No, Prowl, it really isn’t much. Look,” he pries Prowl’s hand away. “Self-repair, see?” Already the wound is closing up.

“I need to take the Senator into private custody,” Orion says.

“He’s a suspect.” 

“ _Is_ he?” Orion asks. His optics narrow above the mask. “You may come question him if you find it necessary, then — where he will be in my Rodion Police Station. I would investigate the relinquishment clinic with you, but keeping him safe is my _first priority_. A third senator won’t die tonight.”

 

* * *

The tele-screen is loud with Proteus’ announcements. Shockwave sits in Rodion station watching the feed flicker by, and he’s not surprised when a bot appears announcing Momus and Sherma’s death. 

“Professional analysts report back with the preliminary announcement that the murders have been the work of Decepticons,” the anchor says. “Decepticon brands were painted clearly along their backs, and as some of the most highly valued members in our society, Senators are unfortunate targets for these terrorists–“

Roller leans forwards and prods the remote, and the screen morphs. “We should let the murder investigation run its course,” Proteus is saying, agains with his hands clasped over his chest.

“Oh, the _freak_ ,” Shockwave mutters, uncurling his fingers from where they’ve clenched into a tight fist. 

“In the meantime, I stand by the pledge I made when I announced the _Decepticon Registration Act_ , namely, that I will grant the Decepticon movement _formal political party status_ if — and only if — at least ten thousand Decepticons register themselves as such. There are only forty eight hours left to register before my promise _closes_.”

“He’s _easy_ ,” Shockwave says, looking over at Orion, who stares intensely at a map of all that has transpired so far. “Orion, we’ve witnessed first-hand what Sentinel likes to do. This _reeks_ of Sentinel guided by Proteus.”

“It does,” Orion agrees. “It can’t be a coincidence. The time frames are too close to be independent.” He frowns behind his mask. “I was told that there was a _bomb_ — a bomb in plain sight. And that by the week’s end, Proteus would break his promise, and Sentinel would _make his move_.”

Prowl and Chromedome choose to storm into the office then. Chromedome thrusts a data-slug into Orion’s hands triumphantly, and it’s projected onto the opposite wall as a list of names categorised by threat level. “We found _the Institute_ ,” Chromedome says. “They’re lobotomising mechs in there.”

“That’s _it_ —“ Shockwave says, standing. “That’s _the list_ for the Decepticon Registration Act — the list of _registrants_. I recognise some of the names.”

Ratchet, who’d been called over earlier by Orion, begins theorising with Chromedome. Prowl dismisses it as a conspiracy.

“This isn’t even obscure,” Shockwave says. “Aren’t you an investigator?”

“If you insist that it’s Sentinel again—“ Prowl begins.

“Wait, give me a second—“ Orion says. Attentions turn to him. “Okay — the D.R.A. is a way of rounding up Decepticons to send them to the Institute. Proteus’ stand against all the anti-Deception propaganda makes his edge obvious: he wants them to _trust_ him, and when your final report goes through, Prowl, about how they were killed for _being_ Decepticons by someone else, Proteus seems like the hero. He’s had it right all along while every other outlet was condemning them, and it demonstrates he’s no longer anti-Deception. With the registration closing so soon, bots are perched on the precipice — they’ll go for it.”

“Hang on,” Ratchet says, “say Proteus gets that many Decepticons to register. He still has a _promise_ to make.”

“He’ll break it with the _bomb_ ,” Shockwave says. “A bomb attributed to the Decepticons; he’ll break the promise after it goes off, and then use the list and shadowplay to pacify them.”

Perhaps he should be glad Damus was taken to the Institute long before shadowplay was actively tested. He still has his mind, at least — enough to let him have relationships, enough to keep him deciding his own life.

“Great! So we have a bomb about to go off any day and we don’t even know _where_!”

“We do,” Shockwave says. In his mind’s eye, he sees Skids. Skids, the ever-religious with the Matrix tattoo on his cheek. “Nominus Prime—“

The anchor chooses just that moment to announce, “-Exclusive footage of Nominus Prime’s body being laid in the _Primal Basilica_. Tomorrow, the first of an estimated million mourners will view his corpse. For many, it will be the first time they have see the _Matrix_ up close.”

“It’s the _Matrix_!” Orion says. “The _fake_ Matrix— they’ve turned it into a bomb that’s kill thousands and desecrate a religious landmark— _the ultimate act of provocation._ ”

“We have to stop it,” Orion announces firmly, and in that moment Shockwave is proud of him. He is so proud of Orion that his chest feels bursting with it.

“Excuse me,” Ratchet says, “ _how_ , exactly? We’re not–“

“We steal the Matrix,” Orion says.

 

* * *

“I know you want to go back to the Academy,” Orion says, “but I want you to stay here. _Please_. I’ve taken the rest of Whirl’s warning very seriously — about the bomb, the broken promise — and I need to take this aspect of it too. I can’t have you killed.”

“Sentinel’s already tried to kill me once, and he knows that went awfully,” Shockwave says. 

“Shockwave,” Orion says, and just holds his arms and rests their helms together.

Easing Orion’s worry means much more to him than saving a few hours, so Shockwave replies, “I’ll stay.” He gently prises off one of Orion’s hands and intertwines them instead.

Orion’s entire frame relaxes. The other mechs in the room are trying not to stare so obviously, some of them filing out into the corridor already.

“I heard what Prowl said,” Shockwave murmurs.

And we can’t tell our respective superiors about it because _everyone’s in on it_. Apart from your _Senator_ friend, of course, who just happens to be the _one good ‘bot_ in a rotten system!

“It doesn’t bother me,” Orion says. “They said more, you know — about the Omega guardians. Spark splicing. All your voting history.”

“I’m glad it doesn’t bother you.”

“Of course it doesn’t,” Orion says, trying to urge Shockwave to look into his optics, his face-mask retracting. “I _know_ you. I _know_ you voted for those things, and you explained to me why.”

“Orion–“ Shockwave says, and wants to say so much to him in that moment but just can’t seem to find the words. He settles for showing it instead. “I have something for you that you asked for.” 

“Wait.” Orion nudges their noses together. Shockwave’s learnt that it’s one of his favourite acts of intimacy — simply because otherwise it’s hidden behind the mask. “Give it to me when I return. I’ll be back. I promise.”

“I know,” Shockwave says. “You always come back.”

He’s left in the Police Station while Orion, Ratchet, and his assortment of outliers head for the Primal Basilica. Chromedome and Roller are with him, standing at the consoles.

Shockwave sits, rolling the gift around in his hand. It’s the picture frame he’d promised, looping the short clip of Shockwave handing the spark-reader to Orion and then kissing the side of his helm. His own one of Orion sleeping at the desk is still back in the Academy, and for a forlorn moment he wishes he had them side-by-side.

He likes to think about the time they spent together. All their time in front of the memorial. Quiet moments in the shuttles together. Making a mess of his laboratory. They’d met in Shockwave’s apartment once, too, and Shockwave had rode Orion’s spike into the berth while fitting as many toys into Orion’s valve as possible. Then they’d lazed around his apartment until they both fell asleep in each other’s arms.

The Shockwave in the image kisses, smiles.

Shockwave made the frames on his own. There’s a small cog on the back that, if turned ten times, will convert enough potential energy to keep the image looping for a _year_. It’s a fine art in efficiency. He finds that sometimes memories don’t suffice — or they get damaged, or, over time, they simply start to fade. But while all the other photos of his outliers in his room are stills, there’s something special about a _physical_ video clip. The looping ones take great precision to make to such efficiency.

He’s seen ones sold before that return ten turns to run for only two weeks. It’s a rarity in itself.

He loves being able to create something and watch it bring Orion happiness. Two of his three favourite things, rolled neatly into one.

Chromedome glances over at him, and Shockwave’s optics slant over at him. Chromedome glances away, but now Roller’s watching.

“You,” Chromedome says, “you and Orion are a _couple_ , right?”

“I could’ve answered that for you,” Roller says.

“How’d that happen?”

“I don’t think you really want to know,” Shockwave replies. 

“Actually — how’d you change Ratchet’s opinion of you?” Roller asks. “I _noticed_. He tells me to lay it off now.”

“We argued.”

It’s the truth, although bent slightly. He certainly hadn’t changed Ratchet’s mind by arguing. It was just Orion. Orion — with the capacity of changing mechs' minds to follow him to the ends of the world.

Except Prowl, perhaps, Shockwave thinks, and looks the image over again. 

What an unlikely pair they make. Or maybe it hasn’t been as surprising as others treat it to be. Orion and his vivacious search for _knowledge_ led him to Shockwave, and Shockwave’s search for honesty led to Orion. Perhaps it was only the natural course of things.

Would they still have met, if Orion hadn’t stormed into the Senate that day? Or if he hadn’t kicked down the door one faithful night in the pleasure-house? Shockwave likes to think that they would’ve. That, like two paper boats alighted in different streams, they would have always been swept towards the ocean and found each other there.

He loses himself in memories of them, looking at the photo. He can feel his spark pulse in time. 

Hours pass like that in their mutual silence, but he has no fear. Orion will return. 

“I don’t know how you can just _sit there_ , Roller. We should be helping Pax, not–“

“Watching _me_?” Shockwave says, and subspaces the photo as he stands.

“That wasn’t what I was going to say.” Chromedome turns away, back to the telescreens. “I can’t believe Pax just told me to _stay behind_.”

Shockwave knows it’d been because Prowl had demanded it of Orion. He walks up to tell Chromedome exactly that, but then on the screen suddenly plays his greatest horror.

His Academy is burning. 

“No,” he says, because his _mechs_ are in there. His outliers. The mechs from Dead End who’ll have no where to go. 

“Door,” Roller says, standing in a huge sweep of motion and gripping his blaster. “Hide. Both of you. Go on, _shoo_! I’ll deal with this.”

The door blasts off its hinges and Roller, enormous as he is, is sent sprawling. In the smoke that clears stand four enormous mechs. The one in the forefront — Kroma, Shockwave recognises him from Orion’s descriptions of the bot who’d started this whole mess with Whirl — is grinning. “Best tip off ever.”

Roller fires at them, but it’s answered by several shots straight to his chest, and the charge from them skitters all down his wires until Roller is convulsing against the floor, energon spraying out of his mouth in a hot gush. Shockwave is halfway through a transformation, gripping Chromedome’s arm, when he’s flung to the floor by a gigantic hand and then seized. 

“Stop!” Chromedome yells, but his yell dissolves into a cry of pain.

The hand spans Shockwave’s entire torso, holds him like a doll until he’s level with Kroma. “What a _lot_ of trouble you’ve caused,” Kroma preens, grinning widely. “Flirting with agitators is one thing, but building an army of outliers? What did you _think_ Sentinel was going to do when he found out? And he’s been looking into you, for _sure_.”

“Go to hell, _Kroma_ ,” Shockwave grits out, his vents clamped shut by the titanic mech holding him.

“You’re going to be cleansed and controlled — and it’s been a very long time coming. If I was a more _compassionate_ mech, I’d shoot you in the head right now. As it is, I—“

His vision lurches up as he is flung, but the tight band of pressure is released, and then he’s falling — Orion spins in a swirl of transforming metal and throws an arm out in front of him. “Leave this to me,” he says. 

But Kroma is still standing, stalking over to where Roller lies on the ground. “I don’t want to fight, Captain. I want to _swap_.” The smile widens. “Hand him over or I flash-fry this one’s brain.”

Shockwave- can’t _stand_ it. He sees the indecision in Orion’s frame, and realises this is the moment he’s dreaded coming to pass: the moment where Orion’s justice is faced with conflict between personal and the greater world. 

Orion wants him to live. Shockwave knows this. He knows that, above all, above everything, Orion wants Shockwave to live — but he can’t justify letting Roller die just because he personally loves Shockwave more.

He remembers their first kiss in the dead of the night, and the conversation that followed it. 

_No mech should have to choose between sacrifice and another’s life._

_Then hopefully, you will never have to make that choice._

How will Orion look him in the optic knowing that Roller died because of him? How can _Shockwave_? How can Shockwave live knowing that he’s killed Roller? 

“Well?” Kroma asks, pressing the blaster hard enough into Roller’s helm that it makes him groan and energon leak from between his lips.

Shockwave thinks about how these months — nearly a year, now, since their first meeting — have been the happiest of his entire life.

“No,” he says. “I can’t let this happen.”

“Wait!” Orion says, grabbing onto his shoulder, “what are you–“

Shockwave holds onto that hand and eases it away, curls the photoframe he’d taken out from his sub-space into it. “It’s over, Orion. I’m surrendering.” The fight has gone on long enough, too many mechs' lives in turmoil just because of him.

He’s tugged forwards, heavy duty cuffs — practically unbreakable — snapping around his wrists. Orion’s optics follow him, wide and— for the first time, utterly desperate. Helpless.

Shockwave smiles at him. He feels in his spark that this is the best choice. For all of them. And he doesn’t want Orion’s last image of him to be afraid. 

Orion has been so brave for him. Shockwave just wants to be brave for him back. “Remember me as I was,” he says. 

 

* * *

They take him away and have a hand on him at all times. They don’t put him under. The cuffs stay on all the way to one of the many Institutes, and Shockwave remains silent through Kroma’s jibing. 

He’s escorted into the depths, through the hallways of this particular Institute, and taken into a dark room with an uplifted table and pushed onto it. They strap his legs down and his arms and his torso down, and although Shockwave tells himself that this is the right choice, he realises that he’s started shaking. 

They don’t put him under.

They press the blade into the rim of his skull with no pre-empt, just like the scars of all those mechs he’d seen, and the pain is more than Shockwave could’ve imagined as it sinks in. He realises then that despite his decision, despite his level-headedness that he’d chosen it with, he _is_ afraid.

He’s scared. He’s so scared and there are only unfamiliar faces surrounding him, leering down at him, pressing the blade deeper that with a whirr starts to spin. Metal and energon fleck out over his face as his skull is sawed open, and Shockwave sees it all. 

He screams and screams and screams and is terrifyingly cognisant as they draw the blade over his head. They are half-way through when it stops. The handle juts out from his forehead into his vision. Shockwave’s systems are panting, twitching, energon running down his face. It hurts so much, it hurts and it _hurts_ so badly that he just wants it to be over even though it’s barely started.

They’ve paused. But they haven’t stopped because someone’s come to rescue him. There is no one to rescue him this time. They’ve stopped because they realise they want to take his body apart before they take out his mind. He thinks that’s what they want. He’s not sure. He doesn’t know what they want. All he knows is that they lower another saw towards his limbs and he screams and wants it just to _end_ so badly as it ruptures his wires with its thousands of teeth. It seems to happen slowly, the first hook of the saw catching onto a wire, piercing it, and then pulling it back until it snaps, then another and another and another until all his wires are churned into its mess.

And in those moments, when they saw open the rest of his head and dip their fingers into the cranial fluid spilling out, when they put a drill to his optics and he’s awake for every moment, he regrets it. 

He’s so afraid. He’s not brave at all. 

He wants Orion. He’d give anything to be back with Orion. Anything. 

Oh, god.

He’s so scared. The pain is unfathomable. They take every part of him — except his spark, and even then, he wishes they did. He wishes they'd just killed him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Changeover. Anything to report?”  
> “Not really. They brought someone in for treatment. A screamer.” -- unnamed security mechs in one of the Institutes, mtmte, #11.
> 
>  
> 
> There is now also a [poster](https://feluff.tumblr.com/post/174624721776/%20rel=) for this fic.
> 
>  
> 
> [](https://ibb.co/ckpXa8)  
> 


	10. The Dead Cry Out

**** Systems: Initialising.

An eyeball opens wetly. Shutters part like lips and stretch thin strings of lubricant between them. The eye closes, opens, wider, dilating to accommodate for the darkness, indeterminable flickers of light pulsing within its lens.

It sees a hand, an arm, a torso, a face open in a scream. It sees another, and another, and there are more than hundreds of them, bodies lying together, heads open, streaked with old oil, the floor swimming with amniotic fluid and thick energon. To the right, past the clammy drains, a door creaks on its hinges with the wind. Two audials rise at the sound as the metal bucks, straining against its hold as though something immense is on the other side and wishing to push in. 

There is a low roar of running liquid as fluids pour away, rushing down the drains in small waterfalls. Energon sloshes as the body stands. Where there were once hands are claws. Where there were once features is nothing. Where there was once worry… is nothing.

Memories filter through a rebooting processor: Long nights toiling for discovery. Jhiaxus. A steady stream of climbing numbers that branch out into millions of delicate theories like filaments of a gold-spun tree. An Ionian law enforcer. An ultimatum.

Cybertron perches on the brink of extinction. This fact is claimed as his primary directive—

His?

Ah, yes.

His designation is Shockwave. 

He rises from the sea of dead. The door kicks under his claw and then gives, and it yawns wide into a blaze of light that his optic contracts to absorb. A sky bluer than any mech can hope to fathom stretches before him, over the edge of the horizon, and its paint-like strokes are chased by turbo-gulls’ caws riding the wind. The roaring in his audials thunders to impossible heights as an enormous solvent ocean crashes into cliffs below.

What is this emptiness he feels?

No. Not emptiness. He feels- _nothing_. The nothing is almost disturbing in its presence, so thick and heavy it is tangible. It envelopes his processor, winds tendrils into every thought, and calmly names itself… logic. Is this logic? It is cold yet burning all at once.

The door slams behind him, caught by the wind. Then the gust tries to tear it from its place again, the two caught in an eternal struggle. 

Shockwave is faced with a sloping cliff-path upward. When his surroundings present no alternative path, he takes it. His limbs are bulky and new, and his processor automatically adjusts for changes in centre of mass, memories now re-catalogued and still searching for a primary operatives as he sways.

Preserve Cybertron. 

This is his primary objective. This, he knows, and re-categorises it as such. He will be able to pursue it to greater lengths than before, no longer entangled in emotions and responsibility. There is a warm weight to _knowledge_ and it is enough to fuel him.

Possible secondary objectives display in his feed, but before he can consider them, his comm-link crackles and establishes to the closest satellite and comes online. He has 37 missed calls, most of which are from Orion Pax. Another one is patching through even now.

There is no need for Shockwave to hide. He accepts the request and immediately the familiar voice of Orion Pax speaks to him. “Shockwave! You’re- you’re _online_.” His incredulity barely conceals exultance. “Tell me where you are. I’ll come get you.”

“Orion Pax,” Shockwave says, considering his options. Orion Pax is his Conjunx; this is fact, and cannot be altered through any known method. It is a weakness in him. Should Orion Pax die, Shockwave’s spark will inevitably follow. This precise detail of their relationship is known to none — except possibly Soundwave, should he have witnessed their initial coupling, or _Ratchet_ , should he take spark readings of Orion Pax and realise that they share frequencies and patterns.

He doubts the Ratchet will offline Orion Pax to reach him, and Soundwave has no antagonistic motive if he knows at all. It is entirely possible that their merging was never recorded. Nonetheless, their status should remain secret. It is too large a flaw on both of their behalves to harbour. 

Moreover, Orion Pax is an impediment to progress. In the months that Senator Shockwave had fraternised with him, his productivity fell by nearly 35% at its peak. A Conjunx is simply a distraction that Shockwave cannot afford. 

“Shockwave?” the mech is asking. “Are you still there?”

“Yes,” he says. “It will relieve you to know that I am functioning at acceptable physical status.”

If Pax is distressed that Shockwave’s vocaliser has changed beyond recognition, he disguises it well. “It does. More than anything.“

“Though I must update you on recent changes.” Shockwave pauses to let Pax absorb his statements. He is aware that emotions are delicate. Encumbering. “I am not the mech you befriended.”

His voice is no longer the warm tones that Orion Pax will recognise, his helm no longer elegant and curved, his optics no longer expressive, his scent no longer his once-favourite wax, his posture, his words, his processor itself— destroyed irrevocably. 

When he thinks of Orion Pax, he sees advantages and disadvantages, a net worth. He knows that this is not what Orion Pax seeks. He knows he cannot give Orion Pax what he wants.

“My work continues at my forefront.” He is no longer weighed down by the fear nor the trepidation of the Shockwave before. Through the destruction, change arises. A new axis of exploration has opened up for him, but there is no room in it for this mech. “I suspect that I will adopt measures that you do not condone.” 

Orion says, with complete conviction, “You can’t believe that. I _have_ and I always _will_ accept you, Shockwave.”

“I am not the mech you know.”

“I know that’s not true. I know you— the _real_ you — the one I feel is still there!”

The familiar spit-fire determination is recognisable, but it seems dull somehow. Where it had previously stirred Shockwave’s spark, now there is no reaction at all. His single yellow optic contemplates emotionlessness in the face of what used to be his greatest motivator, and he pauses in his journey up.

He recalls every one of their meetings, every gasp and grasp, every uttered breathless word, but not one kindles any emotion in him. They are only that: memories. They are observations of a different life. “I feel nothing, Orion Pax. It is for our mutual benefit that we do not meet. Consider us two strangers whose sparks will simply gutter with each other’s.”

“I know you’re still there!” Orion bursts out. Shockwave does not need to see him to know that he has a hand clasped over his chest, his dark red paint and shining glass, and delivers it with all the confidence of a speech. “You can’t tell me that you don’t feel it too! Don’t you? My _spark_ , Shockwave — it’s right here! I can still feel yours and it _aches_ for us! How can you tell me that they’ve taken us apart?!”

“We are not those lovers in tales who part for the ends of never being separated again,” Shockwave explains patiently. “We are _here_ , and here your emotions and irrationality prevent you from accepting this reality.”

“No!” Orion says. “You can’t give up, Shockwave — you can _fight_ what they did to you!”

“You are mistaken. ‘Fighting’ has all the futility of reassembling the ashes of an artwork: what has occurred is irreversible. My processor has not been _altered_ ; its components have been removed entirely, reformatted and _incinerated_. It would be prudent for you to accept the current circumstances.” 

“I believe in you,” he says, but Shockwave senses a growing quality of distress. “You can find a way. I know you can. My Shockwave– he can do anything.”

“Your Shockwave is dead.” 

He presses all the finality he can into the statement. It is physically impossible for Shockwave to return to the self that Orion knows him as. Orion has determination, yes, but Shockwave has _fact._

Then Orion suddenly says, “I love you,” and although he’s attempted to keep it level, his voice betrays an abrupt unevenness of emotion. 

Shockwave hesitates as he formats a reply. It would be unwise to tip Orion further into emotional upheaval. Shockwave’s safety is still contingent on Orion retaining some modicum of self-preservation. “That is not a wise mindset to maintain,” he says. 

“ _Mindset_? Shockwave — it’s written into my _spark_. It’s written into our _souls_!”

Orion’s distress is greater than he’d expected. “I do not wish you alarm you.”

“I know you don’t,” Orion says. “I know you don’t. That’s the worst part.”

“I _am_ concerned for your safety,” Shockwave clarifies, “but do not interpret it as a gesture of altruism. It is for my pragmatism in survival only.” He disregards responding to Orion’s outburst. No response he makes to it will be satisfactory. “I will contact you fortnightly to ensure that you are well. Is this understood?”

The line is quiet.

“Furthermore, it is in our interests that our spark bond remains unknown.”

A pause, and then, “If I spread the knowledge, what will you do?”

“I find it difficult to believe you would willingly go against my wishes,” Shockwave says. If Orion reveals their spark bond to mechs who would use it against him, the solution is simple: he will kill them before they do so to him. He does not inform Orion of this. “Secrecy is for our mutual safety. In the times that are to come, I suspect I will make a number of great enemies.”

“I’ll comply, but I want to hear you reply to me.”

“Reply?” 

“To what I said before. I want to hear you respond to it. I don’t _believe_ you can say it without-”

Shockwave is still familiar with Orion’s tones and moods. Within a few nano-kliks he knows which phrase Orion refers to, and it brings him no qualms. “I love you too,” he says, monotone, no intonation nor affection in his tone. No flicker of emotion rears its head. Shockwave is incapable of experiencing it. They are only a series of sounds, to him.

“We part forever, Orion Pax,” he adds, more softly, when he hears Orion’s elbows connect with some sort of desk or wall. “We go to different worlds.”

“I believe in you-” Orion says, but Shockwave ends the transmission and his audials are filled with the heavy wash of the solvent sea instead. 

A sudden pulsing in his spark is either from its memory of Orion Pax or its aberration that he suspects has not been removed. He considers — and then disregards it. He currently has no means of removing the aberration, and he does not plan to remain in prolonged contact with Orion Pax. Fortnightly correspondences will suffice.

Instead, he turns his processor to more significant issues. He requires a _laboratory_ — one that harbours no misgivings about the experiments he intends to perform and can proceed in relatively unchecked. The energon crisis requires a solution. While he plans to return to the remains of the Academy to search for the world-seeds, they are too long of an investment to rely on. 

Previously, he’d discovered synthetic forms of energon that he’d rejected for the side effects and insufficient means of testing them. The thought now… is _wondrous_. He can sense ideas sparking from it, endless possibilities, whole _branches_ of science he’d previously been unable to explore. Yes. He must pursue it. This is of no doubt. 

He reaches the head of the cliff-face, where buildings and the city grows into view like a metal forest rising around him. The buildings gleam like gravestones and the solvent sea bellows behind him. A small fishing shack sits on the edge of the cliff — the disguised point for dumping empurataand shadowplayed mechs.

Hailing a shuttle is as easy as it once was, and as it arrives he contacts Starscream. “Who is this? Senator Shockwave?” Starscream asks. “Well, I never thought I’d see the day that _you_ called me. What is it this time?”

“I have a proposition,” Shockwave says. “Ask your master Megatron if it is agreeable.”

“He’s not my _master_.” 

“Your benefactor, then.” Shockwave follows the definition of a master as a mech with others working for him. It is not inaccurate. When Starscream is not forthcoming, he adds, “Starscream, simply put: I am neither informed nor care about the semantics of your relationship.”

“Ooh,” Starscream croons as though delighted by his reply. “I heard about your new _paint job_ , you know. Guess they did knock around a bit more than your _paint_.”

“Rest assured that it has only catalysed me. I require a new laboratory and resources with which to work, and I presume it will be in Megatron’s capabilities to provide as such — and I’m certain that he has requests for me to pursue.”

“I’ll talk to him,” Starscream says. 

*

“Do you pledge your loyalty?” Megatron asks from the doorway, watching Shockwave over. Shockwave knows that Megatron does not trust him because he is a senator. He has followed Starscream’s advice in this recruitment alone. 

When Shockwave looks at Megatron, he sees why mechs are tempted to follow. His spark is potent, his build so powerful that his optics leave trails of red where they go, and his words are overwhelmingly earnest, much like Orion Pax’s. But Shockwave is never tempted for a moment.

“I am not a member of your cause,” Shockwave replies. “You wish for a gestalt to be made. It will take time.”

“I need to know if you’ll spill _secrets_ , Shockwave.” Megatron seems to shift as he talks, a great instrument of motion, anger tightly held.

“I am not privy to your secrets. If you do not trust me, trust in my pragmatism. For what reasons would I antagonise you if you are providing me materials with which to research?” One unwavering yellow optic is turned in Megatron’s direction.

“You antagonise me even now with this gesture.” 

“I do not antagonise you,” Shockwave corrects. “I simply make my stance clear for ease of future interaction. I am not your warrior, Megatron. I am not your pet. I am not your scientist in a bottle. I am simply _here_ , a chaotic element with whose timeline yours momentarily coincides with.”

“My, my,” Starscream says. He slinks from the corridor, behind Megatron’s hulking mass. “Making friends already, Shockwave?”

“Is it customary to make one’s place in a hierarchy clear on their first arrival.”

“And where is yours?” Megatron asks. His mouth is set in a frown, optics narrowed. “I dislike the word _hierarchy_. A _hierarchy_ is what a Senate would instil upon hapless mechs. We fight for _equality_ here.”

“Yet you request my loyalty.”

“To the _cause_ , not to me. To _freedom_. There are few here who fight for me rather than for their autonomy; I want to know whether you see me as a freedom fighter or a terrorist, Shockwave.”

Am _I_ a freedom fighter or a terrorist? For all of his assurances the bots of his revolution are equal, Megatron asks about what Shockwave sees in _him_. He reverts to ‘I’ very quickly.

“By the Generalised Diction of Cybertron: A freedom fighter is defined to be a mech that partakes in a revolutionary struggle — typically a political one — to overthrow its governing force. A terrorist is defined to be a mech that uses unlawful violence and intimidation, particularly against civilians, in the pursuit for political aims.” Shockwave sees Starscream cock his helm. “It does not reveal any aspect of my allegiances to inform you that objectively, you fulfil _both_. Rather, you request me to label _connotations_ of negativity to one or the other.”

Now Megatron is watching him curiously. They do not understand him, Shockwave presumes. “If this is true, and what you seek is to know whether I view you negatively, the response is _no_. You are currently my contractor. Therein lies the extent of our interaction. Your pursuits are not relevant to me.” 

Megatron is a freedom fighter. He is a terrorist. He is an _opportunity_.

Megatron says, “Even though, inadvertently, it was _my_ revolution that led you to be as you are now?”

“Perhaps I should thank you for that. Senator Shockwave’s troubles are no longer mine.”

“If that is what you choose,” Megatron says. “I understand your place.” He turns to leave. “And I wish you luck with your work.”

Shockwave pauses, then he turns his soulless eye to Megatron and scrutinises him carefully. He has been incorrect about Megatron; the mech is more short-sighted than he’d appeared. “I do not require luck.”

“Don’t think too hard about it,” he hears Starscream say to Megatron as they depart. “Shockwave was, and still _is_ , one of the greatest minds in Cybertron. Just consider him a _black box_ — and you know what they say about abysses. Don’t look in or they’ll _look back_.”

“He should be angry to have been altered so severely,” Megatron says, and their voices fade into the corridor. 

*

In the following months through Orion’s calls, his grief is all concealed. He talks to Shockwave as though Shockwave is still the senator he knows, informing him about his week, the finalisation of Sentinel’s case, Zeta’s advice, and that he and the remainder of Shockwave’s outliers are now outlaws and underground. He doesn’t tell Shockwave where he is exactly, and he doesn’t use his name, but Shockwave can hear the background noise of voices he recognises: Glitch, Skids, Roller, Trailbreaker, and more. Sometimes he hears shooting, but Orion never sounds to be injured.

Orion signs off with an _I love you_ and pauses expectantly, where Shockwave realises he is supposed to reply in turn. He does so, as smoothly and emotionlessly as the first time, and Orion hangs up.

Body after body results from the work in his laboratory. The progress for combiners comes surprisingly easily, but Shockwave is not hurried for their progress. He intends to explore alternative energon methods. 

Now, instead of rigorous testing under theoretical and manufactured conditions, he is given mechs to experiment his trials on and they prove far more useful. He is not _satisfied_ , however. Neither is he eager, nor pleased. Shockwave does not feel anything. He knows objectively that he is making progress, and knows objectively that progress is what he pursues.

The globe approaches an energon crisis. Shockwave will not watch Cybertron die. In his notes, he names the goal _Regenesis._ _Regenesis_ _b_1, he writes, and categorises the mechs he’s been sampling from. He lists frame size classes, fuel levels prior to synth-en injection, frame damage, processing power, and when he finds that its enthalpy of combustion is too high to be admitted into regular energon processing units without causing them to overheat, and that it’s possible his iron-strontium-chlorine mix will result in long-term build-up in lines without the means to process it. Some isotopes work better than others— and there are so many _variables_ that Shockwave will need more to test. 

He removes fuel-processing units and basic frameworks for mechs’ systems: primary energon lines, engines, processors, and builds a series of racks to hold them as he trials energon through their systems. In the rows he has them ordered by size. In the columns he has them varying by unique types, and has labelled them accordingly. 

A less informed mech would say that his laboratory appears to be a butcher shop. Intestines are unspooled and clamped into the racks so that energon process can be tracked, stomachs, livers, all meticulously cleaned, hanging in their places, Shockwave observing and taking notes. And just as a butcher shop, no part goes unused. 

The remainder of frames are smelted down. Many of them are alloy-mixes, contaminated with lesser-valued metals, but the majority of them are war-builds and the most contain traces of worthwhile material, and all of them contain some degree of sentio metallico. Shockwave puts the unused blast furnace on the other side of his laboratory to use and sets the heat to 924ºH as a trade-off temperature that the unfavourable metals melt at. They are processed out the other side of the smelter in long streams and Shockwave separates them as thoroughly as he can, an instinctive urge to _horde_ and compile resources for the possibility of requiring them in the future.

Fumes churn out from the furnace as he slides bodies in. Their optics and processors and any usable components are removed and organised into another system. He has no pre-programmed AI nor helper hands: everything is maintained by himself, and he doesn’t expect Megatron to gift him with drones to aid his work. 

Shockwave is working at the smelter when Starscream arrives; fumes pour from around him, funnelled into a series of pipes and multi-stage distillation chambers along the walls and ceiling. 

When the final body slides in, he straightens, closes the front latch of the smelter and stands. Starscream wears a look of abject horror, but it isn’t directed to the furnace. It’s the displays of stripped-down systems and organs, various blends of synth-en filtering through their lines.

He recovers quickly though, and meets Shockwave’s blank look with palpable affront. “What?” he asks. “I’m just here to check in on you.” Shockwave had refused cameras in his laboratory, and now he knows that Starscream, like Megatron, would rather not have a constant feed of _this_ into either their systems. “I didn’t expect you to set up shop _quite_ so quickly.”

“Because you surround yourself with the inefficient,” Shockwave says. 

Starscream looks around the workshop and Shockwave sees his optics dilate. The seeker is uncomfortable, but Shockwave does not care. Shockwave strides to the end of his distillation system and checks its readings — 99.32% purity in sentio metallico produced at the end of line, higher grade than most mechs have access to these days — and then he hears one of his holds play an alert.

Dozens of lockers line the wall. He regards the results of a certain one he opens: internal combustion originating in the auxiliary torso-feed line, possible adverse reaction to the silicon base, feed pressure spiked prior to the explosion, spark rates that had been rising steadily had also peaked… Shockwave notes it all down and hauls the mech out of the locker. It struggles slightly but its heavy injury renders it weak. Moreover, many of its internals are too damaged for him to consider salvaging. He magnetises it to a berth but is disappointed when he sees the state of its components, littered with old scars from circuit-boosters. He already has controlled test cases for weak fuel pumps, sparks and processors. He does not need this one, and it has degraded in state since the last time he performed its maintenance. 

Starscream follows on his heels like a silent judging observer. “Would you like a component?” Shockwave asks. The question is meant to intimidate. Shockwave does not want frequent intrusions into his laboratory.

“I’ll pass on that one,” Starscream says, and sounds a little bit ill. 

After he finishes his diagnostic report, he unlocks the berth, rolls it across the laboratory, and tips the mech still-screaming into the smelter. The mech melts before he even sinks into the boiling insides, metal sloughing into liquid like mud, optics oozing, his face-plates dripping together, all his crooked teeth revealed as his cheeks fall in chunks, his frame bowing inwards, begging and pleading for help until it dissolves into a howl, and then Shockwave calmly closes the front latch before too much heat escapes — but not without letting it linger just a klik longer than usual for Starscream to see.

He is half-way to his desk and console to update its contents with the latest autopsy when Starscream’s kneels buckle and the seeker retches over the floor. 

“You contaminate my laboratory,” Shockwave says, without turning around.

“You–“ Starscream manages. “What _is_ this?”

“My materials are recycled. It is only economical.”

“I thought they would’ve turned you into some sort of mad scientist,” Starscream spits, wiping at his intake. The walls are a pristine white. “The sort that works in a grimy little basement. Not– _this_.”

“You should come to expect efficiency from me, Starscream.”

“How is this what you’d call _efficient_?!”

Shockwave does turn to look at him now, and he knows that the unreadable nature of his single optic unnerves Starscream. “Resources are scarce; I cannot rely upon my standing funds to deliver _here_ , nor can I rely on Megatron continually receiving what components I have asked to be delivered.”

Starscream doesn’t appear to know what to say. He just gestures with a servo at everything surrounding him. “This–“

“Perhaps you would be comforted by the delusion that I derive some sort of guilt from it,” Shockwave says. “Or that I find some pleasure in witnessing the offline of mechs you consider innocent. Perhaps it would comfort you to think that I can be categorised into an archetype– because there is. There _is_ an archetype that you may use to predict my actions.”

Starscream is still standing there, his half-processed energon a mess at his pedes, watching Shockwave warily. “And what is it?”

“Neither the unwilling scientist facing guilt nor the sadistic one gleaning pleasure.” His optic glows abnormally bright. “It is what you pass everyday — what you are inordinately familiar with. A light fixture in the corridor. A navigation system. A chronometer. The sequence of electrons in a weapon barrel and the mechanism in an opening gate. I am the _machine_ , Starscream.”

It seems that something stretches from Shockwave then, some eerily long shadow from his blocky body, some horror flexing a million steel jaws and spindle-claws and thousand cogs-eyes that Starscream sees. 

“Clean it,” Shockwave reiterates. Starscream doesn’t hesitate.

*

When Shockwave enters, only Starscream and Soundwave otherwise are present, so Shockwave does not know why Megatron has called for him. He is not a part of Megatron’s high command. He catches the tail-end of Megatron’s planning, but still he hears enough to understand what is to take place. 

The Senate will be torn down from within. Soundwave and Starscream play vital roles in that. Starscream stands proud as he listens, Soundwave stiffly. Shockwave analyses the latter reaction carefully, helm openly turned in Soundwave’s direction. He had not assumed that Soundwave would be uncomfortable in Megatron’s presence. Or is it _his_ , Shockwave’s? Soundwave has not seen him since his empurata. Is it the fact that Shockwave had been his previous benefactor? 

With his telepathy, Soundwave should know that Shockwave is not the mech he was. Yet Soundwave does not look at him. He keeps his visor trained deliberately on Megatron. Only when Megatron finishes speaking does Soundwave glance over, and seems to be alarmed when he sees Shockwave watching back. 

“I never asked how you were turned over into Ratbat’s care,” Shockwave says. 

“I am still.”

It wasn’t the implied question, but Shockwave hadn’t asked directly, and he doesn’t care too much for the answer. He observes Soundwave more closely, the way his visor and mask hide his expression but his frame is still readable, and then looks over to Megatron, who is also watching the blue mech. 

Meanwhile, Starscream takes his leave, strutting as usual, and Shockwave can’t help but attribute this to his aversion of Shockwave. Ever since the incident in the laboratory, Starscream has steered clear. As desired. Starscream is pitifully easy to frighten.

While Shockwave’s attention has been turned to Starscream, Soundwave has resumed watching him. In moments, Shockwave catalogues the action, pulls up old memories, compares—

“You have been attempting to read my processor,” Shockwave says. Subconsciously, his optic throbs brighter. Soundave is attempting to read Shockwave’s processor and _failing_. He has seen this frustration in Soundwave before, before when he needed to have his servos around a subject’s helm in order to read them, to focus, and found it difficult. “What do you hear?”

Soundwave looks away and does not answer, and that movement alone stokes Shockwave’s suspicion. The possibility that Soundwave _cannot_ read him grows. Megatron steps in front, placing a hand on Soundwave’s shoulder to subtly steer him out of the room. His subordinate goes. 

“Shockwave. It is good to see that you’ve heeded my summons.”

“I do not see the reason for them.”

“Come.”

They fall into stride. Shockwave detects the rumbles with each of the gladiator’s steps — but Shockwave is not exactly the delicate frame as he had once been, either. They make for a dark and intimidating pair. Megatron commands power when he goes, red-thick battle lines drawn across his frame, optics blazing, and Shockwave… is a void of light. 

“Tomorrow we bring the war to the world,” Megatron says. “It has been brewing in the underside of streets, lurking in the alleys, _forgotten_ in these Pits, but we will be _heard_!”

“And in these times to come…” one of his fists clenches tightly. He looks at it between them. A symbol of power. Of rage. “There are no fences. There are no havens. Inaction _is_ action. Silence is a stifled shout.”

There are too many loaded statements for Shockwave to unpack on a conscious level. He stores them, analysing and re-analysing, always watching, always judging. 

“You are either with us or against us. Shockwave— there is no reality in being _for your own_.”

“I understand,” Shockwave says calmly, understanding that here he treads a thin line between _truth_ and inevitable wrath. The truth is that Shockwave is for his own and will _always_ be. Megatron speaks of the oppression of the masses — either Shockwave fights for them or he doesn’t. 

And Shockwave does not. 

He does not fight for the people of Kaon. He does not fight for Megatron. His battlefield is the _laboratory_ and against _time_. He seeks to create dwindling resources, not for one mech, but for their planet in its entirety. For their species as they know it. 

And long has the field of science been tarnished with this line that Megatron sets. In his field there is the discovery of truth. There is the desire for transparency. It is all contaminated with the self-interest of individuals like Megatron. It is tarnished and bent, a bit forced in its mouth through the need of labour and credits, _reined_ in the direction of benefactors. Shockwave has been freed from the lines of his own previous moral impactions and devices enforced by the whims of the Senate, but here he walks from one set of guidelines into another. 

Fight for me, is what Megatron says. Create for my fights. Only this way will I allow you to continue creating and discovering. 

Shockwave had agreed to these terms on his own. Now, he is faced with Megatron’s _arrogance_ of it. There is righteousness there. There is self-confidence. Megatron believes this is the way it should be. For all that Megatron says he understands, he views Shockwave as his scientist in a jar.

Shockwave does not feel it. There is no cold flush, no change in his spark, no signal from his plating, but in that moment, he meets another realisation.

This mech will be at odds with him. Forever. They meet at a single tangent, and from thereon, one or the other will be forced to bow. As of now, the submitter is Shockwave. Because Shockwave does not have pride locking his legs, and because Shockwave… feels nothing. Their divergence is a merely a divergence. It has been inevitable, a compromise, and Shockwave is not resentful. It is simply the outcome of their scenario.

“I am already here and constructing for you,” Shockwave says. “Your statements have been redundant.”

“Then our side provides for _our side_ ,” Megatron says. A door slides open for them, lights slowly flickering on. A wall of hands and arms greets them, old and new, powerful and decorative, chroma and black-grey. “Your progress must’ve been hampered with your claws. Take back what they have taken from you.”

Shockwave is stepping forwards, inspecting hands, flexing their joints, estimating prehensile strengths. “Yes,” he says. “It has.”

Another attachment catches his optic. It appears to be a simple blaster-barrel, but Shockwave knows better, because _he built it_. He remembers creating this weapon, atom by atom, a quark microscope guiding his path, locked into hyper-intensity as he laboured for months on end. It had been the fruition of multiple prototypes, a new blaster-type, only for the richest of clients. His client had been murdered two weeks later. Shockwave had never found the weapon.

Now it is here. 

Shockwave is momentarily unconcerned about what set of events had led to this moment. He lifts the gun from the wall. “This will serve me better in the times to come,” he explains. There have been times in the past where Shockwave has been without a weapon. In this manner, he will always have one at his side, and this one is _his_.

Megatron smiles down at him, like the moon splitting. 

Shockwave returns to his laboratory not long after. It spans a single corridor and several rooms and is locked off to all others, bar Megatron and those he authorises. It is possible, however, for Shockwave to override the function. He has made adjustments to its system already if he should ever require it.

He will first inspect if there are any viruses left dormant in these extensions, both the hand and the gun he has acquired, and then he will attach them to his frame. One curious change of the empurata means that his frame-type is now much more compatible with various modifications. Theoretically, he could wrench any arm off the general population and attach it to himself with only rudimentary tools. 

Then pain lances through his spark. His knees buckle; his whole body convulses.

Immediately his processor leaps to the _growth_ , the aberration he has been neglecting in the assumption that it was non-malignant. His chest-plates part, windshield splitting in two, and he stares down at his spark that is throbbing uncontrollably. What is happening to him? The off-shoot — is it killing him? Another seizure racks through his frame, and he clamps down on a static-laced shout, bowing over his laboratory bench.

The pain is excruciating. He’d thought that the pain was past. He sees the spark beat in him, distend, and then with a twist that lights his every wire on fire, it is free. It leaps out of his chamber entirely like a miniature star and skitters madly across the laboratory bench, light reflecting across the walls before it. In another arch it flies from the bench and latches onto the _sentio metallico_ deposited at the end of the distillation array.

While Shockwave’s rational mind tells him to destroy it, something else holds him back when the living metal begins to ripple. The shape that emerges from it is undeniable. At first, only a thread, and then a droplet in reverse, pulling away, bouncing back onto the table— it is a sparkling — small, cylindrical — that rolls across the surface towards him. He has spread his claw before his processor fully responds, capturing the little thing before it falls to the floor and injures itself. 

His–

This is–

His processor seizes for a moment, cataloguing through all the possibilities, and it arrives at just one. He has created a _sparkling_ through means unknown. Never before has he heard of such an occurrence. It is unprecedented. It is _revolutionary_.

He knows instantly that it is his greatest creation, and lifts it reverently in his claw. It beeps in reply, still warm, wriggling happily against him. Its optics and general shape has not formed yet, still nothing but a white rounded cylinder.

He knows that, even now, Vector Sigma slows even further. Its last sparking was vorns ago. Shockwave… what he holds now is the key to their entire race — somehow. Explanations for the situation rush through his processor, each more impossible than the last. An aberration in him that allows his spark to reproduce like an organic. A conspiracy that stunts the fertility of every other Cybertronian. But _never_ has this happened, and Shockwave has been listening in to secrets for vorns and vorns, from Sentinel to Nominus Prime to the deepest crevices of the Senate, the dark plunges of the Institute, and _never_ has this occurred.

Whatever havoc they should wreak upon their world, however far Megatron chooses to destroy, however much the Senate chooses to corrupt, Shockwave knows now that the Cybertronian race will not die. 

“You will live until the end of time,” he tells it, and part of his chest slides back into place. He gathers up further scraps from the his laboratory, sanding down particularly rough edges, filling his chest compartment with them. The sparkling squeaks delightedly in reply when he places it in with all the scraps, body parts of other mechs, and after a moment of hesitation, gives it one more rectangular object he has been keeping in his subspace. 

He cannot let it run amok in his laboratory. It will be his greatest secret.

The hand and weapon return from his scans as clean, and he replaces the claws with an air of distraction. He can feel his sparkling rolling around in his chest compartment, bumping blindly into everything. 

Tomorrow.

_Tomorrow_ , he thinks, and finally thinks about what is to occur tomorrow. His side has been chosen, and for a brief moment he debates the merit of this side. Will he be able to defend his sparkling on Megatron’s side? But he looks back at his laboratory, with its body hanging from the racks, with the blood and lives of other mechs refined down the walls, his sparkling born from the dead— and he acknowledges that this is one of the few places he may indulge in his practices. 

The need to be able to protect himself and his independence rears stronger than ever. He wants to trial his newest weapon, and does not prefer to do it in the gladiatorial ring and reveal any more information of himself to the mechs of Kaon. He slides the windshield back in place and leaves, taking a shuttle out of the city to Dai Atlas’ home. The ride is long; his return will be through the night and into the morning hours of the Senate’s meeting, and subconsciously he lifts one of his new hands to his chest-piece glass. It is opaque, and the sparkling does not have optics yet, but a few rolls and a gentle thud on the other side tell him that the sparkling senses his presence.

As he crosses half the globe, he knows that Megatron’s plan slides into place even now, and that a riot explodes in the heart of Kaon. The sky flickers between low and distrustful colours, sliding into evening, on fire, and then into the dark of night. A small tele-screen in the shuttle gushes the events to him as the hours pass.

When he finally arrives to see Dai Atlas, he rings the bell with little hesitation, gun already humming to life as he waits.

“I’m coming, I’m coming,” he hears. “Who’s– Shockwave!”

Dai Atlas admits him, smiling. “It’s good to see you. I haven’t seen you in session for so long! But what are you _doing_ here? Did you hear Sentinel’s emergency meeting? The Senate is travelling to Kaon. Are you finally showing your…”

His smile trails off only moments before the shot connects.

Shockwave does not kill him, and when he looks down at Dai Atlas’ mangled and smoking body, he does not know why. The power achievable in the weapon is more than enough to. Perhaps the Shadowplay has been imperfect. Perhaps some flaw still lingers. He sends an emergency ping and then leaves — some medical team will find Dai Atlas. He will not die.

Shockwave returns to his shuttle to leave for Kaon. The sun begins to rise. Every news outlet congratulates Sentinel Prime for capturing the Decepticons and Megatron himself. When Shockwave enters the temporary chamber, it is full of excited whispers. Other senators gather there in droves already, and Proteus stands before them all. Senators fill the stands. Their metal gleams.

Shockwave believes that it’s a waste of his time. He wants to return to his laboratory. He feels his sparkling tumbling around in his chest, anxious for space to wander. He presses a hand against the windshield class, and feels the sparkling pause and settle on the other side.

He deliberates over the need to find some way to hide the sparkling from Soundwave. It is not shadowplayed as he is. Is it? There is no precedent for his case. He does not know. 

As Proteus talks, Shockwave considers solutions. He could order a mnenosurgeon to alter the sparkling’s processor, but finds himself rejecting the idea almost immediately. It is too dangerous and he wishes for the sparkling to grow as naturally as possible. Shadowplay could lead to complications in its development, and, furthermore, he is not certain that shadowplay would conceal its thoughts from Soundwave’s probing. 

Soundwave relies on his hearing; he listens to the fire of neural pathways and instinctively decodes them into direct thoughts. Shockwave’s hypothesis is that what exempts him from the telepathy is the sheer _difference_ of his processor. Soundwave has never been able to read the minds of different species entirely, nor of the crazed — and that is what Shockwave is now. Processors follow a strict format, which is precisely why mnenosurgery can be studied at all. Yet his neural pathways have been altered and scrambled into alienness impossible for Soundwave to decode. 

Moreover, he recalls trying to let Soundwave read the minds of those that spoke different languages, such as various mechanimals — all Cybertronians instinctively seemed to think and process in Universal Cybertronian … and that while Soundwave could still pick out emotions of the mechanimals, never specific _thoughts_. 

With these in mind, Shockwave turns back to his solutions. He could hide the truth from the sparkling forever. Disappearing into his laboratory for weeks and months at a time has not been an unusual occurrence so far. Sparklings matured fast, unless this one was an exception — he could simply let it grow and then claim it as his _assistant_ , or as one of his experiments.

Yet to fool Soundwave would be to fool the sparkling itself. He is not sure if it will instinctively recognise him as its carrier. He refuses the idea of leaving it for another mech to raise. _He_ will observe it. It is too dangerous otherwise. If the sparkling somehow believes it is not his… it could _betray_ him. It could attempt to leave. It would be confused and resist Shockwave’s continual monitoring. And, crucially, in the circumstance of Shockwave’s offline, it will not know its own secret. 

Shockwave vacillates between these two options until he discovers a third. 

He will teach the sparkling a different language. He will _invent_ one fundamentally different to any other form of Cybertronian thought. It would be a boon even to him, he realises. In creating a new form of communication, he may also encrypt his research notes into a form that no other mech would understand. 

He sets about designing it immediately. Around him, the Senate falls into hush as Starscream is brought before them. Shockwave pays no attention to their words. Starscream spits jibes. _Nice place_. The Senate demands his obedience. 

Starscream raises his weapons. Soundwave stands behind him as Ratbat’s personal assistant at the door. 

In instants, metal is crumbling around Shockwave. Senators around him are screaming, fleeing. The senator in the seat beside him slumps over, a hole in its spark. Shockwave crosses his arms, blocking the glass while Starscream delights in the massacre, offlining senators that never have fought a day in their lives with ease. The doors are locked. Soundwave has clamped down on all communications. There will be no escape.

Body after body falls in a cacophony of screaming. Energon splatters onto his desk. Shockwave intends to collect the frames, after. Their metal is of the highest quality if Starscream doesn’t mangle it all, and, speaking of the seeker, Starscream alights on the bench in front of him and tosses a greyed body into his lap, “Aren’t you going to join in, Senator?” 

“You have this well under control.”

Starscream looks back, and grabs a senator by the helm, dragging him forward towards Shockwave. It’s Proteus. His optics are strange in their fear, in their repulsion, in their desperation. “I know you’ve got a vendetta,” Starscream says, his smile broad and wicked. 

Proteus had been the shadow on his life for the longest while. He’d stolen everything Senator Shockwave had ever cared about: Senator Shockwave’s outliers, his laboratory, his paint and his beauty, his autonomy, his thought, his dignity, and even attempted to take his spark. Yet here he is now, writhing in Starscream’s hold just as every other mech does in the face of Death’s gaze.

“Don’t you feel like killing this one?”

Shockwave has nothing for him. 

“I do not feel anything, Starscream,” Shockwave says, and sits there composing his new language as the Senate burns down. 

*

_ ████ M _█_ NTHS AGO. _

There is a crunching through the rubble as Shockwave strides through. The Academy lies in pieces, allegedly burnt down through a faulty proplex pipe, though the effects and signs of arson are clear. 

There is little use mourning it. It has fallen. The wise action now is to scavenge before Megatron replies to his offer.

A frame gleams through the crumpled metal. A picture. Still-moving. Orion Pax sleeps gently in a rectangle of polished metal, untouched by the world of horrors around him. 

The crunches pauses. His shadow falls over the picture frame, and it is lifted from the rubble between two claws.

Shockwave categorises the action as a momentary lapse, mere curiosity, but cannot bring himself to put it down. He stares at the image for a moment, analysing every small movement depicted, his spark throbbing oddly in time — Orion Pax, sleeping, unaware of the future that lies ahead — and then he stores it away into his subspace and continues on.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Their call is adapted from their meeting & dialogue after Shockwave's empurata in RiD #17. Dai Atlas was spared, and Megatron asks what Shockwave would call him: a terrorist or a freedom fighter? in that same issue.
> 
> This was inspired by the amazing StarlightCaptivator's fic, Our Old Tricks. It opened my eyes to the possibility of writing long-fic(s) for these two where they would, through great hardship, reach sweetness. Read it if you haven't already! It's lovely and gentle and leaves you warm inside out.
> 
> Nearly all mentions of art are attributed to Ravel — Maurice Ravel, a French composer. His name is in the title. Any poetry or prose that is quoted or mentioned is some edit of the literature his music references, and any music mentioned is some edit of his compositions, albeit under different names.
> 
> I'd also like to refer to canon once more. For how few (3) issues Senator Shockwave does make an appearance in mtmte, his off-screen relationship with Orion is surprisingly loaded. I've quoted most of it already, but here's a recap:
> 
> \- Whirl says that they (Shockwave & OP) are "fraternising".
> 
> \- Roller says that Shockwave is "stringing [Orion] along" and that Orion "love[s] it".
> 
> \- Kroma says that Shockwave's been "flirting with agitators", which is likely Orion, because Orion dissented in front of the whole Senate and Shockwave hasn't been known to interact with any others that fit the description.
> 
> \- Orion calls him " _My_ Shockwave".
> 
> \- Orion says he waited for him in front of the Ark monument "day after day" after he was taken.
> 
> \- In Prowl's rant to Orion he also shouts about how Orion sees Shockwave as the " _one good 'bot_ in a rotten system".
> 
> \- Orion "looks angrier than [Roller] anticipated" when Roller voices doubt about Shockwave and finishes a tirade with, "I trust him, Roller. End of conversation."
> 
> \- General overprotectiveness of Shockwave. He orders Shockwave to be taken into protective custody even though Shockwave says he's being overcautious. Orion jumps off a platform hovering as high as a building and drives back to the station because he'll get there faster and he's worried. When faced with Kroma, Orion flings an arm in front and says, "Leave this to me."
> 
> \- After Shockwave is taken, Orion says, "They took him, Chromedome. They took him." and he guns it to where he thinks the Institute is, kicking down doors.
> 
> \- In the panel in police station when they're all gathered together, Orion is standing there holding Shockwave by the arms while the others talk.
> 
> \- And, of course, the fact that at the end he coaxes Shockwave back down from his shadowplay by reminding him of "our bench" and the closed energon bar and the little details. He says, "Think of us!"
> 
> \- In hindsight, when prompted to talk about his friendship with Shockwave, Optimus says, "Shockwave was... Yes, he was... complicated."
> 
> \- Shockwave was also pretty as all hell and knew it. No way cop-looking-for-something-better-Orion stood a chance.
> 
> This fic has been me joining these dots and writing between these lines.
> 
> If I was more ambitious, I would let this fic's sequel go on for much longer, run through far more of the canon events even through the war, bridge through the entirety of IDW, ditch the mechpreg, and re-write canon to do these two justice. But I'm not that familiar with IDW, and I don't have enough faith in my abilities to go that far. Unravel was possible because Shockwave's canonical appearances were mostly limited and I could keep the world controlled around him.
> 
> So in our sequel to come, Shockwave raises his sparkling among the 'cons and we labour for our happy ending. It will be very canon-divergent, unlike Unravel, and I plan to fill more porn-fics and shorter projects between now and then.
> 
> That said, I wish I could've given them more time together. Sixty thousand doesn't feel like enough. Give them thousands, thousands more, and still– it runs out.
> 
> But, as ever, thank you all for tuning in. Given the rare-pair, I've been expecting Unravel to go as just another momentary shadow in the archive. So if you're here but you'd been hesitant coming in, if you've reached this despite doubt or unfamiliarity... thank you. It really means a lot. 
> 
> I hope it means as much to you as it does to me.
> 
> See you next time.


End file.
